The Known World
by skypig21
Summary: Imprisoned by a cruel and repressive government, John, Rodney and Teyla are forced to make sacrifices to save each other's lives and keep the flame of hope burning. Warning: Very lightly implied noncon. Also, bugs.
1. Part 1, Chapter 1

_Rather long introductory A/N: This is a long work, broken into three main sections and then into chapters. It is completely written. Chapters will be posted frequently after they have received their final polishing. My eternal love and gratitude go to my Holy Trinity of betas: **Pranksta**, **Klostes (Inkling)** and **Aslowhite**. You have given me so much help and support, I can never adequately thank or repay you, although I will try._

_After I had given this story a title, I Googled it. As it so happens, "The Known World" is also the title of a novel by Edward P. Jones. Jones's book, about freed black slave owners in the American South, is an astonishing work. I highly recommend it._

**The Known World**

**Part 1: "Fine."**

"We shall create among our people a brotherhood of like bodies, like thoughts and like deeds. In this we will find purity and peace."—New Kalian Constitution, folio 23, script 9.

**Chapter One**

Pistoule sits with his fingers in his mouth, mumbling around the digits, salivating all over his hands. On good days, he rocks back and forth and side to side. On bad days, he throws himself against the force shield and hangs there until the guard cuts the power and lets him fall to the floor.

John Sheppard wakes up to a freezing morning. Yesterday greeted him with the crackle of Pistoule suspended in the field, then the thunk of him hitting the floor. Today Pistoule, who lives in the cell next to John's, is chewing his fingers, talking nonsense. The air is so cold that a puddle of hoary frost has formed on the wall beside John's head, where his breath hit it as he slept. The frost has been there every morning for the past three months. Four months. He's forgotten how long it's been.

"How's the gourd, Sheppard?" A disciplinarian points to his head as he walks by John's cell and holds his stun weapon a little tighter. John's pretty sure that no one's forgotten the last time he tried to take down a disciplinarian, that no one ever will. He can't recall exactly what happened, but they treat him like he's such a badass, it doesn't matter.

At breakfast there's the usual phalanx of insects. One of the larger breeds, which resembles both a cricket and a cockroach, stands defiantly on the pitted wooden table. It waves its antennae at him but doesn't move away. John used to read the newspaper in the morning, way back when he was younger and living in a regular apartment with a more-or-less regular life. Now he watches the crickroaches, as he likes to call these things.

After he's eaten, John is let out in the fresh air for ten minutes. They do this twice a day, so he can see that the sun here rises and arcs across the sky, just as it does everywhere else.

On occasion, they stick Pistoule outside with him.

"So you can have a nice talk," says the disciplinarian, laughing, before he shuts the Play Yard door. That's what they call it: The Play Yard, as if the empty space, a rectangle of loose dirt and small stones confined within cinderblock walls, has swings and a slide and a sandbox, as well.

Although his next-cell neighbor doesn't interact with other people, John speaks to him anyway, as he would a pet.

"So. Pistoule," he tries to sound conversational. "How's things? Gotta girlfriend, yet?"

Pistoule doesn't respond, not that John thought he would. The brain-damaged man is rather shorter than John, and much, much thinner. His brown eyes appear large above sunken cheeks and below sparse, wispy brown hair. He is not an old man and, surprisingly, his teeth seem to be all there and his skin is still smooth, not yet withered by age or violence. When he gets excited, Pistoule laughs and cries and screams and tosses his body around. Surprising, then, that he doesn't look more beat up.

John can't help but feel sorry for Pistoule. What scares him is how often he feels like he wants to put his arms around the little guy and give him some real, human comfort.

In the time that John has been held here, he has seen a lot of really bad things happen to other people. A lot of really bad stuff has happened to him, as well. He's limping because of some of it. His memory's not so good. The distal portion of his right pinky is gone, but the skin flap that the doctor folded over the joint has healed with just a little pink scar running across it.

After standing in the dirt for a little while, John is brought back inside to his cell. There he sits all day, or paces, or works out doing handstands and pushups. He sings, although the prisoners nearby tell him to shut up. He talks to himself, reciting mundane stuff about the life that he's lived so far.

Today, John pretends that Teyla is sitting with him on his bed, her arms wrapped around her knees, while he talks about pizza delivery on Earth.

"You just call up…"

"Call up?"

"On the phone. You can order any kind of pizza you want—pepperoni…"

"Pepperoni?" she interrupts again.

"It's a spicy meat thing. Sort of like those tubular plants we ate on P9B-755, only instead of plant stuff inside, pepperoni has spicy meat. So, back to the pizza…" And he goes on and on like this, describing each ingredient to Teyla until he has exhausted every detail on the subject. If she's still there when he's done, he talks about something else, like TV shows or dog breeds. She is always patient and curious, just like the real Teyla.

In the late morning, three disciplinarians armed with stun rods show up outside of John's cell. One disengages the shield while the others stand with their weapons drawn.

"Come," says one.

"Why?" asks John, even though he already knows.

No one answers, but one man catches John's upper arm and pulls him out onto the latticed walkway beyond his cell. When John recoils, he is touched with a rod, twice. He falls to the lattice walkway, still conscious but unable to move.

The disciplinarian who stunned him leans down, grabs the prisoner by the ankle and drags him along.

In his cell, Pistoule bangs his bed around, rattles the thin metal frame against the wall and lets the legs of it scrape along the cement floor.

John knows where he's going and he knows what's going to happen to him there. When it's over, the machine will have done whatever it does, and John will have bought himself another day of life.

They promise him a few minutes with one of his team if he cooperates, so he tries being nice these days. They promised him a few minutes with Teyla or Rodney, even though he hasn't seen Rodney in long time. Ronon is dead, unless he found a way to survive a 500-foot free fall without a parachute. The jumper cracked open like an eggshell, and Ronon was gone.

While the machine works, John thinks about the shitload of trouble he got everyone into this time. Since she's such a good negotiator, Elizabeth ought to have sprung them by now. The Genii handed her a couple of nukes; surely she could swing Teyla's release, or McKay's.

The machine may have captured these ideas.

When the machine is done with him, John is led back to his cell. He is a little disoriented but otherwise fine. There is only one disciplinarian needed, for now. He holds John's elbow. John doesn't react to this.

Back in his cell with its shield reactivated, John sits on the bed and stares at the wall eight feet opposite him. Then, without even noticing he's doing it, he brings his hand to his mouth. He bites down lightly on the second finger of his left hand. Not enough to cause pain or break the skin. Just a little pressure to let him know that he still has the freedom to do this, if nothing else.

Pistoule mumbles in his sleep.

OoOoO

Because he was good and let the machine do what it wanted, Sheppard is allowed to see Teyla the next day. She stands on her side of the room, he stands on his. One of the shields separates them, so they can't touch.

"You okay?" he asks.

"I am fine," she replies. "They still have me working, cleaning floors." There isn't a mark on her, so he's happy about that.

They look at each other, letting several precious seconds tick by. Finally, Teyla breaks. She asks, "What are they doing to you?"

Sheppard wants to say "Nothing." He wants to say "Something terrible," but instead he says, "I don't know," which is as honest an answer as he can give. Sometimes he remembers just before the machine; sometimes he remembers right after. It's the in-between time that remains lost to him. Teyla looks at him strangely. He blinks to clear his head.

"There's a machine…" He doesn't know what they're doing, whether they're copying stuff or denuding his mind or putting things in there. He knows only that a minute or two with Teyla or Rodney, if they ever let John see him again, is the only thing standing between him and suicide.

Teyla says encouraging things but that don't penetrate. "What would you do if I were dead?" he asks.

Teyla doesn't reply. He'll take that as something of an answer.

"Have you seen McKay?" he asks. The other most important question.

With a head shake, Teyla looks at John with little darts of fear in her eyes. She is good at telegraphing, something at which he's much too obvious. "His illness is worse. He was taken to the infirmary days ago, and I have not seen him since then."

Teyla and McKay are friends, now. It took a long time for that to happen, but John is pleased that it finally did.

A black hole of failure opens up within John, dragging in Teyla and McKay and even the memory of Ronon. Hindsight is packed with would haves and should haves.

The Kalians presented a benign society. They showed McKay their inventions, agreed that the Wraith were a mutual enemy, and treated the team to spectacular stage shows celebrating inclusiveness and diversity. After the agreements were signed, once Atlantis was thought to be an ally of the first order, the team was shown the Kalians' rotting insides.

John thinks that he should have looked deeper sooner and knows that he ought to have kept his mouth shut once he had. Instead, he sent vague messages to Elizabeth that the Kalian security details intercepted. After that, it was all downhill.

"They're taking my sense of hope," he whispers, very sadly, very, very sadly.

John knows that if Teyla could, she would reach out and not just put her head to his in the Athosian way. She would wrap her arms around him and let him bury his face in her neck. She would kiss his forehead and stroke his hair. The shield makes her look a little wavy, makes the tears brimming in her eyes look like tiny tsunamis.

He feels ashamed to have said this, because he is supposed to be the bright beacon of hope for his team, even if he doesn't really feel that way.

The lights in the room go out. They disappear from each other. Visiting time is over.

OoOoO

John dated an emergency-room nurse for a while. She once got to talking about people who had tried to take their own lives and mentioned one person as having had "multiple failed suicide attempts," as if that poor soul were a _triple_ loser.

John doesn't feel like a loser at all; he feels empowered. One of the other prisoners says that crickroaches have a little sack inside of their bodies that carries a mild poison.

"If you eat a _sorlen_ of the loza bugs, you will die," he says. John asks what a "sorlen" is, and learns that it is about a hundred.

So John finds a box and starts collecting crickroaches, first from the place where he is sent to eat each morning, then from bathrooms and from hallways and from dark corners. He wraps the bugs in the remaining fabric scraps from his Atlantis uniform, slips them into his pocket, and then places them in the box after returning to his cell. Lozas are large insects, twice as big as regular black crickets and not nearly as charming. John knows that many insects on Earth have probisci, but he is willing to bet that most don't have actual _tongues_, and thinks that he will chat about this with Dr. Spiegel, the entomologist recently sent to Atlantis, when he gets back there.

He thinks this even as he collects the bugs with which he will try to kill himself.

Once he has caught a hundred loza bugs, crickroaches, John sits in his cell after everyone else has gone to sleep and consumes the insects one by one. Some of them are dead, others are still alive as he does this. They are extremely smelly.

By morning, John is comatose. Loza bugs aren't toxic to a relatively healthy individual, so John doesn't die, even though he gets plenty sick from them. The disciplinarians take him to the infirmary, where his stomach is pumped and he's given a counteragent. He lies insensate for several hours before waking up with a headache. McKay lies unconscious in the bed next to his. The physicist is ghostly pale and thin, as thin as Pistoule. His blue-tinged lips are slightly parted, allowing in whistling droughts of air, as if he were strangling. John calls McKay's name, but there's no response.

A doctor wanders over after a while.

"What's wrong with my friend?" asks John, motioning a restrained hand towards his teammate.

"Sick," the doctor replies.

"Is he going to be okay?"

The doctor glances at McKay, then back to John. "Look at him," he says. "What do you think?"

OoOoO

The doctor—or whatever he really is—unstraps Sheppard's restraints. A half-dozen disciplinarians stand around John's bed with stun rods ready to take him down if they have to. In the wake of his pathetic suicide attempt, which the Warden described as "amusing," John is not allowed to see either member of his team for the next ten days. He will have the machine twice as often, as well.

As he is being taken from his infirmary bed, John brushes by McKay, jostling him a little. The scientist wrinkles his forehead but is otherwise oblivious. The doctor sits nearby, filling out reports at a small rolling table.

"Some sort of wasting syndrome," he says, pointing to McKay. "We don't know the cause. A parasite, perhaps. Surely, you must have noticed his weight loss, his fatigue."

Surely, yes, but McKay hadn't mentioned his health and Sheppard hadn't pressed very hard.

"You look a little peaked, Rodney. Feeling okay?" he'd asked, as they'd stood with the shield between them in the visiting place.

"Peaked? Did you actually say 'peaked'?"

"Yeah, peaked. As in sick, tired." A pause. "So?"

"I'm sure you didn't mean 'peaked' as in 'pointy.' I'm fine. You?"

They spoke in whispers about finding a means of escape. The disciplinarians overheard and cut the lights, enveloping them in darkness. They also cut the audio, so McKay and Sheppard couldn't hear each other, either.

That had been quite early on, maybe four weeks into their captivity. Sheppard hasn't seen McKay since, although Teyla is allowed a few minutes with him whenever she has been suitably obedient.

The doctor checks McKay's vitals without looking at his patient. John thinks that when he and the surviving members of his team are together again, getting ready to nuke this place, he might slip in and extract the doctor. Then he'll take the doctor to Atlantis so that he can meet Carson and learn what being a doctor is really all about. John fantasizes about this and also about what he will say to the doctor just before he puts a bullet in his head.

OoOoO

A day after leaving the infirmary, John is brought to the machine for another session. He doesn't know what it's doing, if it is indeed doing anything at all. How would he remember if something were pulled from his mind by force? Or placed there?

This time, the machine makes John imagine that his hands look like those of a child, with short, innocent fingers. He even has the missing part of his pinky back.

After the machine, John expects to be led back to his cell, but the disciplinarian takes him to the Warden's office instead. This is unusual, but then everything seems unusual after the machine.

The Warden's office is in the same area of the prison as the machine, just down the hall, in fact.

The Warden is short and round, with soft, pale features, a miniature version of Truman Capote but without the lisp or the intelligence. John thinks this every time he sees the Warden. It never fails to make him smile.

John stands before the heavy, dark-wood desk, in the Warden's dingy masonry-block office, waiting for something to happen to him. He is lethargic from the machine and sways a little.

"Where is he?" asks the Warden, who leans back in his rolling chair, folding his small, white hands over his belly.

Sheppard says nothing because he doesn't know to whom the Warden is referring and, anyway, it's in his nature to refuse to answer.

The Warden unclasps his hands and waves to one of several disciplinarians in the room. A stun rod touches John's back. The weapon is not set very high, so he only flinches.

The Warden says, "He is gone and you know who took him."

"_He is gone."_ Sheppard had been smiling at his Truman Capote joke. Now he smiles because something good has finally happened. Or he _thinks_ that something good has happened. Coming out of the machine, John's ideas don't always connect to reality very well. One time he thought that Teyla was hiding something important from him, but when he saw her next she seemed okay and relaxed and completely pulled together.

"I don't know…" John begins, as a stun rod makes its point in the area of his left kidney. The machine has ground him down. The loza bugs didn't work out. How long will it take to die from a stun rod? John decides to find out.

TBC…


	2. Part 1, Chapter 2

**Part 1, Chapter Two**

Rodney McKay doesn't like incompetent doctors. The one standing before him is the worst he's ever met.

"I'm sick and you haven't given me anything for it. What's wrong with you people?"

The doctor ignores him.

McKay doesn't like needles, either. The doctor is drawing his blood again, and McKay is very peeved about that.

"You are extremely inefficient," he tells the doctor. "I'm brought here every day for a blood sample…" He has to pause to regain some strength before continuing. "Why don't you take more today and save yourself—and me—the extra effort tomorrow?"

The doctor looks at him from under his eyebrows. "I'm tracking your decline," he says.

McKay feels the adrenaline push of alarm.

"Decline?" he asks. "I thought you were helping me get better."

The doctor shakes his head, scoops up his tubes of blood and walks away. McKay is too stunned to press further. In silence, he moves through an unusually lengthy examination conducted by a nurse or medical assistant. The disciplinarians then return him to his cell, which is right next to Teyla's.

He collapses onto his bunk, sweating and panting and deeply afraid. He is exhausted. Has been for a long time. His lungs aren't working as well as they should. Something in the air or in the water or the food is making him very sick, so sick that, after nearly four months in this prison, his incremental steps into decrepitude have become a steady downward slide.

A stone-block wall separates McKay and Teyla, but they can speak with each other when the ambient noise level is low enough. That night, after the buzzing overhead lights have been turned out, McKay hears his friend.

"Rodney!" she whispers urgently. "Rodney, speak to me!"

Clutching a rough blanket around his shoulders, he goes and sits against the wall adjoining Teyla's cell. Another cold, cold night. McKay is from Canada, but nothing compares with the cold in this place.

"I'm here, Teyla," he says, trying to shore up his voice without straining.

"You were gone all day. Where did they take you?"

"Warden's office," he lies. "He was questioning me about…" and here he tries to think quickly but his mind is slower than he'd like it to be. "About stuff," he finally says.

"'Stuff'?"

"Yes, stuff. Things, items, objects. How are you?" McKay changes the subject. "Did you work today?"

She is silent for a few moments.

"Floors," she says, with enough distance that McKay is now absolutely certain that she is lying. He's suspected as much for quite a while, and no one is more surprised than he is to have picked up on something so subtle—and from a woman, no less.

"Lots of floors?" he asks.

Another pause, and McKay wants to cry.

"Yes," she says at last, with a weariness so direct it reaches through the masonry separating them and crawls into his chest.

They lean against the wall until the cold blocks begin to freeze them. Then McKay says goodnight and Teyla says goodnight and they part.

OoOoO

Today is the first day that McKay cannot eat his breakfast. Until now, he's been able to consume at least a little bit, even if it comes back up later. On this morning, he sits at the table and stares at the food placed before him, incapable of summoning the energy to consume it.

McKay is brought to the infirmary for his daily checkup and blood draw. The doctor examines McKay's hands, his nailbeds in particular, which appear blue-purple. Even though they are still graceful from youthful musical training, McKay's fingers have withered into flesh and bone.

In the afternoon, after the doctor has examined him with more brusqueness than ever before, McKay is put out in the Play Yard, where he stands in the weak sunshine with a blanket wrapped around him for warmth. He hovers by the door the entire time, waiting for the disciplinarians to bring him back inside. Even though it is barely yellowish and lukewarm, the sun is too bright.

Staying on his feet takes too much out of him. When the door is opened, Rodney discovers that he can't move his legs. Fearing that the disciplinarians will think that he is being stubborn by not coming back in, McKay gathers enough strength to say "Help me," so they won't stun him. Instead, the disciplinarians take his arms just as he passes out.

Later, in the clinic, the doctor tells McKay that he will die soon.

Rodney puts his face in his shaking hands and wills himself to be strong. "I need to see Colonel Sheppard and Teyla," he says.

"That won't be possible," the doctor responds. This moment is perhaps the saddest of Rodney's life. His illness has overtaken him and dying will end his suffering, but he wants to say goodbye to those that he will leave behind.

"Then tell them something for me…" but the doctor has once again grabbed up his tubes of blood and walked away. "Tell them…!" Rodney's lungs are not strong enough for shouting. He coughs and lies curled on his side trying to block out all of the terrible things that are happening to him. McKay hopes that Sheppard and Teyla will know what he wanted to say.

In the nighttime, McKay falls unconscious. He lies in the clinic, unattended except for an IV giving him fluids. Sheppard is brought in after poisoning himself with loza bugs. Rodney sleeps through the entire thing, lost in his dreams.

A night after Sheppard's release from the clinic, McKay's IV is removed. The skinny physicist is wrapped in a blanket. This activity rouses him a little. For a moment, he wonders if he has died and is being prepared for burial. Then he is unceremoniously slung over someone's shoulder and carried away. No one speaks, no one shows him much caution, either. He is a sack of potatoes, right then.

Whoever is carrying him runs out into the bitter-cold night, McKay bouncing with each step. The wind comes in heavy, rhythmic swoops as if pushed by rotors or turbines. McKay's arms dangle below his head. When he opens his eyes for a second, he sees a thin line of blood coming from his IV site, sliding down his arm and dripping off the tip of his left middle finger. That's the last thing that he sees for a long time.

Someone dumps him onto a hard surface. A door slides closed and the cold wind stops. The floor shakes beneath him, a regular vibration that speeds up as an engine sound climbs from neutral to full throttle. McKay is unwrapped. Heat packs are placed on his chest and he is wrapped up again. This is the warmest that he's felt in four months. He could die this way and that would be perfectly okay.

"McKay."

It sounds familiar.

"McKay!"

More insistent.

That's all he knows. For now.

TBC…


	3. Part 1, Chapter 3

_A/N: The story takes an even darker turn, here. Warning for mild allusions to non-con. Trust me that things lighten up eventually._

**Part 1, Chapter Three**

Clumps of hair litter the floor of the Warden's office. Teyla sweeps them up. The Warden isn't there. He goes away for this part, while she cleans the floor and dusts the furniture. The prison is heated with a substance that produces huge amounts of soot as it burns. Every surface is coated with this sticky residue, which needs to be wiped and wiped until it's gone. Then, the next day, the dust is back and everything needs to be wiped and wiped, again.

Teyla doesn't have to come here every day. The Warden doesn't want her that often.

Other places need cleaning—the guard posts, the hallways and bathrooms. Her main task is floors, but sometimes they make her polish furniture or wash walls.

Female inmates clean the facility. Male prisoners are used for other things, experiments, perhaps.

When Teyla was told what she would be doing in addition to cleaning, she refused. Then she broke one disciplinarian's jaw and fractured the skull of another. They hardly expected a small woman to be so powerful.

After the injured disciplinarians were carted off, two healthy ones took their place. Teyla was made to stand by a window in the Warden's office and watch as a blindfolded Colonel Sheppard was brought to his knees in the Play Yard below. The Warden whispered in Teyla's ear, told her what her other task would be. She shook her head. He told her all the details, and she shook her head again. Then he nodded to one of the disciplinarians, who took out a weapon and held it to John's head.

"If you don't," the Warden said, "I will kill this man and you will watch him die."

Teyla acquiesced.

McKay's cell is right next to Teyla's. They converse through the wall every night. After she agrees to the Warden's demand and is returned to her cell, Teyla sits against the wall, as close to McKay as she can be. She asks him to stay against his side of the wall to be as close to her as possible, but she doesn't tell him why. He has started wheezing a little. Teyla keeps her voice calm and steady so he won't become upset..

Prisoners are sometimes interrogated in the Warden's office. That is why Teyla finds hair clumps, droplets of blood, and, on occasion, puddles of urine on the floor. Cleaning up these messes helps give her perspective. The Warden is careful. He leaves no marks on the outside of her body.

Teyla is not permitted to see her teammates very often. When they do meet, it is in the visiting place, where a force shield sizzles between them. John and Rodney are forbidden from seeing each other, so Teyla acts as a conduit, passing messages.

"I saw John a few days ago. He is fine," she tells Rodney, trying to keep him from worrying.

If she could, Teyla would sit very close to Rodney and rub her hand up and down his back.

The Warden is jealous of McKay, of the tenderness that Teyla feels for him. A few days ago, the Warden told her, "I want you to cooperate, do what I want you to do, even if your commander dies and isn't here to inspire you." They were watching McKay shivering in the Play Yard below.

Several days later, Teyla is allowed to visit with John, who is becoming more forgetful and miserable each time she sees him.

He inquires about her welfare but seems preoccupied. Then he asks, "What would you do if I were dead?"

This is the most frightening moment since this nightmare began. Teyla is speechless on account of it. Then John changes the subject and asks about Rodney.

She wants to say 'What are you talking about?' and she wants to say 'We are not discussing Rodney, now, we are discussing you!' but instead, when John asks after Rodney, she tells him that he is sick, that she hasn't seen him in a number of days. Teyla still lies against the wall each night, even though Rodney isn't in his cell. She doesn't mention this to John.

He looks ready to cry and tells Teyla that hope is being taken from him. He is obviously losing control, for Teyla has never met anyone has relentlessly positive as John Sheppard.

"Rodney and I are still alive," she says. "We are here for you."

He doesn't appear to have heard her.

The lights go out.

OoOoO

Beyond the functional area of the Warden's office is a small, windowless room. It contains a bed, a short one to make him feel not so tiny. The bed, made of heavy, dark wood, is dressed with a thick mattress and fitted sheets.

Lt. Cadman once received a package from Earth that contained sheets made of something called Egyptian cotton. She showed these sheets to Teyla.

"See?" said Cadman, her eyes glowing with delight. "Sateen! Feel them." And Teyla had admired their softness, how the fabric slid over her skin like warm water.

When she is in the windowless room with the Warden, Teyla doesn't think about the short man or his pudgy, chilly hands on her. She thinks about those Egyptian cotton sheets, about Cadman's happiness, about anything else that isn't this place or this person or what she's doing to prevent John and Rodney from dying before her eyes.

Each week Teyla is taken to a supply room next to the clinic proper for a checkup and a blood draw. Loza bugs creep up the walls and across the floor. She watches them while the doctor examines her. He is not looking for the usual things, though. Sterility is congenital in many of the short, white males of their species.

"I'm just making certain that you are not sick," says the doctor, words so open with meaning that Teyla doesn't know which question to ask first. Not that the doctor is willing to answer any of them. He takes up his blood tubes and walks away.

Teyla hasn't seen McKay for a fortnight. She fears the worst, that he is alone and sick. She leans against the cell wall at night until the chill drives her to crawl up onto her bed with its thin blanket and discomforting squeaks. The arms of fear hold her in the night. Teyla gathers her courage by remembering bright places that she has visited, sunny, warm planets full of welcoming people who didn't want to hurt her.

One morning, Teyla is brought to the Warden's office. Dusty yellow sunlight filters in between the window bars. The room looks almost smoky from airborne soot. A half-dozen disciplinarians stand to Teyla's sides and back as she is seated in the center of the room. This is the spot where Teyla has found blood droplets and tufts of hair. A patch in the dark-wood floor is darker still from the mess that has landed there.

"Where is he?" the Warden asks her. He sits behind his desk, leaning back in his swivel chair with his hands clasped behind his head.

"Where is who?" she replies, and a happy shiver hits her as his words take on meaning. One of them will survive, now.

The Warden may be a small man, but he is powerful inside. His hands come to rest on the desktop, the desktop that Teyla polishes with a smelly oil to make it shine. His little green pig-eyes become narrow and beady as he leans forward. She saw this look the day that the Warden whispered in her ear as a gun was held to John's head. She saw this look when he blithely waved at McKay in the Play Yard, threatening him, as well.

Now he speaks, his voice tight and brittle like a thin glaze of ice.

"Where. Is. He?" he asks, again.

TBC…


	4. Part 1, Chapter 4

**Part 1, Chapter Four**

The last thing that Ronon Dex remembers about being in the jumper is hearing Sheppard say, "Uh, oh."

And, although he doesn't have complete recall, Ronon is fairly sure that Rodney responded with, "Do you mean 'Uh, oh,' as in 'I forgot to turn off the stove' or 'Uh, oh,' as in 'This is going to hurt'?"

What Ronon remembers from immediately before "Uh, oh" is jumbled up in his head so badly he thinks it might never come clear.

Nevillus is the Kalian equivalent of a physical therapist. He is small and light-colored, as are most Kalians, with blue eyes and yellow hair. When Nevillus works with him, Ronon receives constant reminders to be patient because his injuries were severe: broken bones, lacerations, a concussion, internal bleeding.

When he first began to regain consciousness, Ronon struck out at anyone who came near. His limbs were encased in hard casts, and sutures lay in a snaking row across his belly, where the doctor had operated to save him. His brain was addled, shaken terribly, and sometimes Ronon thought that he was back on Sateda in wartime or fighting for his life on a Wraith hive ship.

Months later, Ronon knows who and where he is. The pain is lessening, thanks to the doctors and thanks to Nevillus, who has fallen in love with him.

It is early evening. Nevillus has finished Ronon's therapy for the day.

"Tomorrow you can try walking," Nevillus says, handing his patient a damp towel for pre-supper hygiene. Ronon wipes up and down his arms, and then over his face and head. Long-term inpatients are not permitted head or facial hair. When he was still unconscious, Ronon's dreadlocks and beard were shaved away, so the Satedan is bald and clean-shaven.

The clinic nurses, who only ever see hairless patients, like to look at Ronon. They linger, smiling, when placing meal trays before him, and ask if he has everything he needs. Ronon doesn't smile back. He feels like shit, so, no, he really doesn't have what he needs. The hard casts have been removed, but his healing bones ache.

After his first surgery, a doctor handed Ronon a small, mangled device.

"Do you recognize this?" the doctor asked.

"Yeah," Ronon responded, turning the dead remains of his personal locator beacon in the light. "Shit."

The doctors believe that Ronon fell from a tremendous height. He broke an arm and a leg and some ribs and cracked his pelvis. Anything could have happened, but the idea comes to him out of the blue one day that the jumper disintegrated while airborne, and Ronon literally tumbled out of the sky.

After supper and after performing the required evening hygiene, Ronon takes the sleeping medicine the nurses offer him. He dreams about seeing Sheppard again, and Teyla, about returning to Atlantis, which he misses more than he ever thought he would.

When Ronon asks about the stargate, he's told that it is no longer standing, that the government has hidden it away. When he asks the hospital staff about his team, he gets blank stares, except from Nevillus, who surreptitiously shushes him and finds clever ways to change the subject.

Sheppard would never dismiss the possibility that at least someone survived whatever fate befell the jumper. Ronon honors the Colonel, Teyla and McKay by refusing to consider that they may no longer be alive.

The next day, as promised, Nevillus tries to help Ronon to walk.

"That's very good," he says, holding the big man by his upper arm.

Ronon takes a few steps. His pelvis aches, creaks almost. Despite the pain, in these weeks of healing, this is the best day, yet.

"We will celebrate," says Nevillus. "I will bring you a cake at supper!"

Ronon nods, focusing on his efforts to take five steps, then five more. He feels Nevillus's hand on his arm, and is aware of how the therapist is stroking his bicep. Ronon understands what's happening very clearly. He tries to hide his calculating expression. Until he sees their bodies laid before him, Ronon will believe that his teammates—all of them—are still alive. He will find them, even if he has to take advantage of some strangers in the process.

PT ends and Nevillus helps Ronon back to his bed. A nurse comes in with the damp towel and a dinner tray. Ronon doesn't like the nurses. They wear crisp, white uniforms and round, starched caps on their heads. They act proper, formal even, and Ronon thinks that this is fake and stuck-up. He doesn't like Nevillus much because the therapist keeps coming on to him, as if, once Ronon's able to walk steadily again, he's going to stroll right into Nevillus's arms.

All of this amorous bullshit is extremely annoying. Ronon's been through a terrible trauma and has many more pressing concerns than finding a mate—male or female—right now.

Just as Ronon finishes his supper, Nevillus stops by with a small cake, which is dense and fruity, like the blackberry muffins Ronon eats in Atlantis sometimes. The PT watches Ronon consume the cake in a few massive bites.

Then Ronon says, "I am looking for some people."

The PT cocks his head curiously.

"They're my friends. I need help finding them." His dark eyes meet Nevillus's, making his point.

"I will help you," says Nevillus quickly, intoxicated by the look that Ronon has given him.

"I'd appreciate that."

Nevillus takes Ronon's hand and strokes the back of it. Ronon resists the urge to pull away. He is certain that the therapist has been used like this before and lived through it well enough. The cake sits like lead in his stomach.

OoOoO

About four months after arriving at the Institute, Ronon is sufficiently healed to stroll the clinic grounds. This is a beautiful world, resembling the picture on the postcard of Hawaii that Sheppard showed him once. Everywhere are growing things, pale green, dark green, brilliantly colored flowers with scent so strong it carries far from its source and stays around all day. Small creatures skitter about, insects, lizards, birds, four-legged things covered by thin fur.

The clinic is called the Mann Institute. It is run by Dr. Mann, a trauma surgeon who gave up a large city practice to come to the Land's End of his world to treat and rehabilitate desperately ill and severely injured people. It is fortunate, then, that Ronon, broken and nearly dying, was found near this place.

Ronon and Nevillus walk along a smooth pathway, taking in the cool morning air. The Satedan uses a cane, now, having recovered well enough for that.

"Where did the jumper land?" asks Ronon of Nevillus.

The PT has been investigating Ronon's idea of having fallen from the sky and the possible whereabouts of his friends. He's learned that Ronon was found in a newly mown meadow some distance south of where a space-going vessel, presumably the jumper itself, crash landed.

When Nevillus indicates the direction, Ronon turns towards the crash site.

"Oh, no, no!" Nevillus blocks him. "It is a long way. You will not be able to walk there."

"I'll try," Ronon responds.

And so he limps onward, favoring the side of his pelvis and the leg that were not injured. Nevillus sighs and walks along beside him.

"It is best that you do not go to your ship. The people who are most probably responsible for your situation may have watchers there, government people who are waiting for your return so that they can arrest you."

Ronon stops. This is the first time anyone has mentioned that Kali might be a dangerous world.

"What people?" he says.

Nevillus licks his lips. "For a generation, this land has been ruled by zealots. We are to be similar to them in every way. They tell us where we may work and live. They tell us who we may marry and who we may not. I may not marry anyone other than a female. Can you believe that? The government tells us lies about other nations and sends our children to make war against them. So many have perished, it tears my heart to think about it! Our scientists and artists and philosophers and writers are watched and harassed. Sometimes they are arrested for simply speaking their minds. You and your friends must have angered the government and they came after you."

Ronon remembers "Uh, oh," and he remembers the dizzying sensation of falling and falling…and then hitting the ground. He is wrapped up in reliving these pieces of his past. Nevillus's voice brings him back to the present.

"I must tell you, Ronon," he says. And he waits for the Satedan to focus, a detail that Ronon appreciates. "Many of us are trying to change things. We are part of a network of thousands who can no longer live under oppression. Join us, help us. We will work with the network to locate your friends, if they survived."

"They're still alive."

"I hope that you are correct. If so, then the government most likely took them into custody. It is possible to search the prisoner data records, but that will take considerable time. I am sorry."

It is slow going, but Ronon manages to hobble over to the nearest byway, a vehicular thoroughfare not unlike those on Sateda or even Earth, if Sheppard's postcards are any indication.

Kali is similar to both Ronon's and Sheppard's home worlds in that the people living here own mechanized personal transportation units. On Sateda, before the Wraith destroyed everything, these units were called "sweeps," because they made a quiet brushing sound when they moved. A similar unit pulls up beside the two roadside travelers. The driver calls to Nevillus, who greets him.

"It is my friend, Andol," he explains to Ronon. "He may be willing to drive us farther so you don't have to walk as much."

This is good because Ronon is tired and his leg is bothering him. Andol seems friendly enough and kisses both Ronon and Nevillus hello on the cheek when they meet. Kalians are physically demonstrative people. By now, Ronon is half-way accustomed to being touched and stroked. Andol's kiss gives him pause, however, but he hides it well.

Nevillus asks, "I am so glad we happened to meet up. Will you take us to the place where the small spacecraft came down several months ago?"

Andol seems surprised but willing. Ronon and Nevillus seat themselves, as Andol pushes a button and moves his sweep into the travel lane.

The two Kalians chat amiably.

"How is Marturn?" Nevillus asks.

Andol smiles. "He is as wonderful as ever, my dear friend. Are you close by anyone yourself?"

Nevillus says, "No. Not right now," and Ronon sees Andol glance at him through the rear-view mirror.

The roadway feels smooth like glass beneath the sweep's underbelly. The Kalians in the front seats speak quietly, while Ronon dozes in the back. When the crash site is only a short distance away, Nevillus rouses Ronon and points to the right, down a steep embankment and into the trees.

In a forced clearing lies the puddle jumper. It is partially layered in earth and brush from having plowed into them as it careened out of control. Its nose tilts upwards, with snapped tree trunks supporting the bottom. Sunshine plays along the jumper's side. This Ancient thing in the natural woods seems out of place.

With Nevillus's help, Ronon scrambles down the embankment and approaches the ship. It is crashed, certainly, but not disintegrated. McKay's always talking about "inertial dampeners," which made for relatively soft crash landings in the past. It's possible, even probable, that Sheppard and the others survived this time, as well.

A ruptured engine pod lies agape, telltale scorch marks indicating where a blast blew off the casing. In the jumper's floor, a yawning fissure provides sufficient testimony. The chair is gone and the hole is large enough for Ronon to have slipped through and plummeted to the ground.

This is when it becomes a little clearer. Ronon closes his eyes. He hears the Kalian diplomats explaining themselves:

One says, "You can't expect darker people and women to hold high office!" He chuckles at the ludicrous notion. "They would lead us to ruin!"

Teyla says something pointed, and then Sheppard says, "Teyla speaks for all of us."

Then Ronon sees the Kalian negotiators, sometime later, rummaging through their files, looking for the signed agreements, waving sheets of paper in front of them.

"You signed these documents and they are binding!" the lead negotiator cries in outrage.

"That was before we realized that you misrepresented yourselves," McKay says, handing back samples of Kalian technology given to him for study, and gathering his datapad and other equipment as the team prepares to return to Atlantis.

Later still, the jumper rises into the sky. They can't wait to leave, even though Weir will be unhappy that her trade agreement fell through. In the distance stands the stargate.

McKay dials.

Sheppard says, "Uh, oh."

And that's when the assault against them begins, when the jumper sustains its first hit. That's when they see the stargate retract into the ground. Then the jumper is struck by another round and opens up underneath Ronon so that he falls into the sky.

Shuddering from this torrent of memories, Ronon uses his cane and Nevillus to help him climb the embankment and return to the road. Andol waits in his car. He puts down his newspaper, and starts the motor. Ronon falls into the back seat and covers his face with shaking hands.

OoOoO

That night, Ronon watches the yellow moon rising from the window of his hospital room. His bones and his belly hurt from the day. He's done too much and is sore. Nevillus hands Ronon some water and a couple of pain tablets. Then he kneels and massages Ronon's leg, the one that was broken.

"My friend lives there," he says, following Ronon's gaze.

"On the moon?"

"Yes. He was arrested and taken to a place there where they work with the mind to change it."

Ronon looks at Nevillus, tries to keep the full depth of his feelings hidden. It's hard because he doesn't have any hair to hide behind.

Prisoners are living on the moon.

With a swallow, the pain pills disappear, the water disappears. Although it is strange and almost too perfect, Nevillus understands. In a small way, Ronon is coming to love the PT. They read each other very well.

Nevillus says, "I hadn't thought of it until now."

Ronon places a hand on Nevillus's shoulder. The smaller man seems overjoyed, buoyantly eager to help.

"I will find out if your friends are there," he says, beaming.

"I know they are," Ronon responds.

The nurse brings a tray. It is supper. Nevillus leaves and will be back tomorrow. It is time to sleep, and Ronon sleeps soundly because he knows where his people are. Even with a whole planet surrounding him, an entire world to search to find them, he knows that he doesn't have to. They are there, on the ball glowing in the night sky.

TBC…


	5. Part 1, Chapter 5

**_A/N:_ **_Many thanks to those who provided feedback. I appreciate your support. Thanks also go to my incredible betas, Inkling, Aslowhite and Pranksta, who took on this massive project out of the kindness of their hearts._

**Part 1, Chapter Five**

McKay feels comfortably warm. Soft sheets lie against his flaking skin. Someone shaves Rodney's stubbly beard, then goes a little crazy and takes off his hair, as well.

A day or more, maybe even a week later, someone holds McKay's wrist and comments on how thin he still is but how he has more lung capacity.

Sometimes he wakes up unable to breathe, which is the worst thing, because he hasn't the strength to tell anyone what's happening. Eventually an oxygen mask is placed on his face and a pill is dissolved between his cheek and gum. He feels better after that, but so tired he can't even open his eyes.

"He may have useful information. See if he is ready to wake up."

"McKay."

A deep, rumbling voice, the sound of which almost stops his heart.

_McKay feels the missile impact the jumper. He hears the rending of metal, looks back and Ronon's gone!_

"Wake up."

_A gaping hole in the floor of the jumper. Oh, God, Ronon has fallen!_

"He is breathing too fast."

"Wake up, McKay!"

When he opens his eyes, Rodney sees that whoever runs the Hereafter has a sick sense of humor.

He points to Ronon's head and says, "We're _bald_ in Heaven? Never saw _that_ coming."

Then he coughs until his eyes water.

Ronon doesn't wait for him to finish. He takes Rodney's hand, pulls him forward and embraces him like the brother that he is. McKay is so overjoyed he feels like he's going to throw up. That is how he knows that he really, truly isn't dead, yet, after all.

"I'm dying," he tells Ronon.

"Not so much," his teammate replies. If he had more stamina, McKay would ask another question or six about that. For now, he just wants the bare-bones headlines. Ronon still has him in a massive hug, which feels good but is making it hard to inhale. He pulls away, hoping Ronon understands.

"Teyla? Sheppard?" he asks, fully expecting to see them nearby once his vision clears.

"Didn't have time," Ronon replies. "We only got you. Have to go back."

McKay's bed stands next to a large, open window. Ronon points out beyond it, to the moon, translucent and white in the daytime sky.

The moon. McKay's not surprised to learn that he's been held there. _Go back_. The very thought of returning to that terrible place makes him shiver. He doesn't want to get choked up because he can't breathe as it is, but he can't help himself. The long, hard road they have all been traveling still stretches out before them, especially for Teyla and Sheppard.

"What happened to you?" McKay asks, wiping his eyes on the backs of his hands.

"The jumper took fire, got a big hole in it. I fell out, landed near here."

"Ronon…"

"Yeah. Don't know how high up we were…"

"Five hundred feet, at least. We all thought that you…didn't make it."

Ronon winces. "Fell on a field of cut _massin_ grass. Like landing on a big feather mattress. Still broke a bunch of things."

Now that McKay is taking the time to really look at Ronon, who is unbelievably, incredibly and undeniably alive, he notices purple-red scars on his teammate's head and arms. The man's collarbones rise from the neckline of his shirt.

A nurse brings water and the oxygen mask, both of which Rodney takes eagerly. She hands him a black tablet and demonstrates that it is to be placed between his cheek and gum and allowed to dissolve there. As he waits for the tablet to melt, his hands shake, for he is worn out from these few minutes with long-lost Ronon.

"You rest," Ronon says. "I'll be back later."

McKay is grateful that he doesn't have to explain anything right then. He feels sick in his body and ashamed to be free when Teyla and Sheppard are still far, far away on the cold, cold moon.

"Please get them," he says, and his throat tightens and his lungs feel heavy.

"Rest," Ronon repeats, and he helps Rodney move to a comfortable position, and he brings up the sheets and light blanket so that McKay can snuggle down into them.

McKay uses the last bit of wakefulness that he possesses to open his eyes fully and look at his friend honestly. "Thank you."

"Don't mention it."

Then McKay sleeps.

OoOoO

Strange things are on his dinner tray. A stiff-capped nurse insisted that his arms and face and bald head be washed prior to eating. She roused him from sleep three times today to ensure that his teeth are brushed and re-brushed, even though all that Rodney did in between brushings is sleep.

Now, she stands beside his bed, putting food into McKay's mouth because his arms are still too weak for that. She spoons up some brownish fruit, which resembles overripe bananas. A semi-soft, semi-hard cracker comes next. If he closes his eyes, McKay is not bothered by the sight of the food. When he closes his eyes, he falls asleep, again.

The food stays down for a while. Not all of it comes back up, either. The grinding nausea doesn't abate, though, and every little gastric war is hard fought and won.

"Don't you people have Zofran or Compazine?" he asks, irritably. When the nurse shakes her head, he gets even more irate. "Is there an actual doctor treating me or are you looking up things as you go along?"

All of this is punctuated by coughing fits and gasping and by having to put an oxygen mask over his face. Annoying this nurse is not at all satisfying. Fighting to keep his food down and struggling to issue complaints with uncooperative lungs exhausts him, so he closes his eyes.

"McKay, wake up."

McKay cracks a lid. Naptime, he supposes, is over.

"This is my good friend, Nevillus." A small, pale man, typically Kalian, stands beside Ronon. He seems like a bright little squirrel compared with his bearish teammate.

McKay ignores the introduction. "I think I need a real doctor."

"The nurses here are specially trained to handle your condition," the squirrel says.

McKay lies on his side, curled up tightly to keep his lungs still.

"Condition?"

"You were exposed to a fungal spore common to the moon. Many people are sensitive to it, but your reaction is among the worst I've seen. The spores infiltrate lung tissue, where they grow and produce a systemic toxin that eventually causes anorexia, organ failure and, of course, death."

"The doctor never tried to treat it."McKay is all too aware of his bony wrists and the spider-like veins crisscrossing the backs of his hands. His skin is dry and flakes off, even though the nurses have put lotion on.

"Sometimes they will fail to treat someone and then observe them as they become sicker and die. It is part of their clinical research. A horrible thing."

Rodney tries hard to keep himself pulled together. He's never been as sick as this and it has cut a clear path to his soul.

"Why?" he asks of Ronon, of the galaxy, of the entirety of space.

Nevillus answers, "The moon prison is infamous for its use of captives in social and medical research. It is also a place where people are sent to change their minds. They are experimenting with a machine. It is a prison not for thieves and murderers, but for nonconformists."

"You should have brought back Teyla or Sheppard instead…" He grabs at Ronon for help sitting up, as a coughing fit overwhelms him. Teyla didn't have a mark on her. She said that Sheppard was fine "Lost…" Rodney tries to say, as Ronon supports him. He wants to tell him about lost causes.

"We found you first."

"Get us back to Atlantis…bring reinforcements."

Ronon looks at Nevillus, again, who explains, "The gate has been taken underground."

"Oh. Beautiful."

"I know that you are unwell and missing your friends. All is not lost, Dr. McKay. Luck has been with you and with Ronon. It was fortunate that we found him in the field before anyone else did. His height and skin color and strange hair are not acceptable. He would have been imprisoned if he survived."

Nevillus takes Ronon's hand, pats it anxiously. McKay notices this. He looks up at the Satedan, who stares at Rodney so intensely it almost hurts.

"Yes, well, wonders never cease," Rodney says, avoiding Ronon's challenging glare.

Oblivious, Nevillus continues. "Rejoice that we found you, Doctor. The prison clinic was not well guarded. The prison itself is the only structure on the moon, but it is shielded and cloaked to prevent ships in space from seeking it out."

"Elizabeth might have sent a rescue team, but…" McKay stops himself on the brink of another coughing fit.

"They wouldn't have found you," Nevillus finishes for him. "Not unless they knew exactly where to look."

He brings Ronon's hand to his chest and holds it there, as if it gives him strength.

"Life is full of surprises," McKay says, as Ronon pins him to the mattress with another potent look. "I don't see how two of you…" He shakes his head hopelessly, as coughing finally overtakes him.

Nevillus smiles, as McKay settles once again. "We are far more than two! Many more! Some of us are leaders in our fields, like Dr. Mann, whose clinic this is. But our most beloved leader is held in the moon prison. We know where his cell is, and we need whatever information you have on your friends. Then Ronon and I and others will free them, as well. We fight together."

The small man gazes at Ronon with bottomless depths of love and loyalty and respect, then returns his attention to Rodney.

McKay gives what information he can, but it is hard work for him. He doesn't know where Sheppard's cell is located, doesn't know where Teyla cleans floors. He tries to talk, to stay awake, keep breathing and not throw up. These simultaneous functions wear him out. His knobby knees stick up under the blanket that covers them.

"Sheppard's always telling me to drop a few pounds," he says, ruefully.

Ronon's hand on his shoulder takes him out of his trance. "You'll be fat again in no time," he says, smiling. McKay tries to take offence, but can't get past the affection in Ronon's voice.

TBC…


	6. Part 1, Chapter 6

**_A/N:_ **_Meanwhile, back in Atlantis, among other places…Also, many, many thanks to those of you who left feedback. The chocolate-covered ones were particularly good! _

**Part 1, Chapter Six**

Radek Zelenka steps off the elliptical and goes directly to the cable-motion strength-training station. This is a heavy workout day, so he's sweating a lot, and his shorts are bunching around the crotch. There's lots of bottled water around, but Radek prefers a mixture that he blends himself. He takes a long drink from the bottle he's brought with him to the weight room.

On heavy workout days, he puts in a good hour of cardio and strength training. On light days, he jogs on the treadmill or messes around with the fitness ball.

Zelenka has a new title: Acting Chief Science Officer. With his new responsibilities, Radek finds himself offworld much more often than before. He hates it out there.

Today Radek adds an extra ten pounds of resistance to his quad workout. He adjusts the weights, then lays the strap around the middle of his left foot. He works out to music or to whatever science is in his head that day.

Halfway through Radek's workout, Elizabeth talks into his headset, which he keeps on at all times, even when he sleeps.

"_Radek, are you busy?_" she asks.

He takes a swig of his bottled mixture and responds, "I am in the weight room. What can I do for you?"

This is his code for 'I am sweaty and smelly and not at all presentable.'

"_Can you meet me in an hour in my office_?"

Radek agrees. He knows what the meeting is about. It's about the same thing over and over.

The jumper that carried Rodney McKay and the others into oblivion months ago contained a homing device, a transmitter that has been operational ever since. The Kalians say that the jumper left their planet without incident, which is, of course, lunacy. The craft would have slid directly into Atlantis's gateroom. This is, in fact, what ought to have happened. Instead, the wormhole disengaged abruptly, and, after a panicked few moments, the technicians and Zelenka himself determined that the jumper never entered the Kalian gate to return home.

When the gate refused to reconnect, a military contingent was sent to Kali on the Daedalus. Nothing of the team was found on the planet, not even signals from their subcutaneous locator devices. The moon showed no signs of life at all.

Then the jumper's signal was picked up outside of Kali's system entirely. The Daedalus investigated, but the signal vanished. Every few days, the signal reappears like a siren song across the galaxy. Following the transmitter has kept the Daedalus traipsing through space only to find the signal gone upon arrival at its last known location.

The roving beacon is driving Elizabeth's little madness. She is not pathological, is still in control, but she hasn't been sleeping well since Colonel Sheppard and his team disappeared and, after nearly four months, it's beginning to show.

Radek cares about Elizabeth, cares for her, as well. He watches over her as he watches over Atlantis. He in turn is being watched by the ghost of Rodney's expectations of him and by what he expects of himself.

Elizabeth's office door is closed when he comes by. She is in there speaking with Dr. Beckett, who gives her looks so deeply distressed it makes him think of Rodney and everyone who is missing.

Beckett leaves and Radek enters. He is freshly showered and has combed down his hair with product to keep it tidy.

They meet almost daily. Elizabeth asks about progress in locating the jumper. Radek tells her that the search is ongoing.

"Why can't we track the jumper more closely?" she asks.

They have been over this before.

"It is traveling in a stair-step pattern through hyperspace," he answers. "When we attempt to follow, it drops out of hyperspace then initiates another course. Tracking it takes time."

Elizabeth looks through Radek at some idea elsewhere.

"Yes," she says at last. "I seem to recall our discussing this earlier."

Radek realizes that something besides the disappearance is working on Elizabeth's psyche. He senses that she wants more encouragement than information today, as sometimes happens.

He says, "Perhaps we should walk," and touches her sleeve to let her know that he has spoken.

She comes out of her fugue and rises.

They walk to the great open area outside, where they are met by the soothing breeze and the sunshine. The ocean stretches out monotonously in all directions. Radek almost never looks at it anymore.

"What would you want us to do, Elizabeth, if you were gone as Rodney and the others are?"

She looks out over the sea, and closes her eyes to the breeze blowing on her face.

"I would want you to carry on, of course. What a question."

"We would try to find you with every way possible."

"I know that."

"We would never lose hope."

"I haven't lost hope." She looks at him. Radek imagines that his own expression matches the ones that Carson's been giving her lately. "Maybe a little bit," she concedes.

"A little is understandable," he says. "They have been missing for a long time."

"I know it's not like me, but it's been so long that I wonder if they will ever be found."

This is not what Radek can think about, right now. He's been all over the galaxy looking for Sheppard's team and has the scars to prove it. He's been working to keep Atlantis running until Rodney comes back and doesn't want to consider that McKay may never return.

"Each time we pick up the signal, it is hopeful, yes? Even if they are not found there, even if the signal moves on, there is some reason why it's moving. We will find out. We will find them."

The wind blows Radek's hair around, product notwithstanding.

"_Dr. Weir, message from the Daedalus_."

Elizabeth taps her headset and responds.

To his great relief, Radek realizes that their conversation is over. Tomorrow or the next day, they will repeat some version of today's exchange.

OoOoO

Col. Steven Caldwell, headset in place, speaks while lying on his back in his quarters. His back is bothering him, so he tries to work it out a couple of times a day with knee lifts and such.

"_Anything?_" Elizabeth buzzes in his headset.

"Nothing," he responds. "The signal's no longer broadcasting from this location."

"_Log it. Send the data to us via subspace."_

"Done."

He's been out here nearly four months, following the signal, losing the signal, following the signal when it pops up again. Today he's checking in because that's what Dr. Weir wants him to do each time he finds or loses the signal.

After completing his report to Elizabeth, Caldwell holds his right knee to his chest. He breathes deeply, relaxing into the movement. He has been trolling through this particular area of the galaxy for so long, chasing after the elusive jumper signal, that his crew is about ready to mutiny. They're stressed and bored and…mostly bored.

Secretly, Caldwell, who prides himself on saving the day, believes that Sheppard's team is lost forever. They are dead or they are so confusedly missing that no one will ever find them.

Dr. Lindsey Novak reports. _"Sir, I have picked up the signal. Stronger than before."_

He sighs. "Location?"

"_In the vicinity of Kali's system, again, 76 hours by hyperspace from here."_

This is good. This is closer than any that have come before.

"Initiate a course, send the details to Atlantis as usual."

"_Yes, Sir. Also, sir, I have an idea I'd like to discuss with you."_

He and Novak meet in the mess. It is Oh-Dark-Thirty and no one is around but them and the coffee. Caldwell gulps down four ibuprofen, which will ease the pain from his spasming lumbar muscles for about six hours.

"Advil and coffee in combination will burn out your stomach lining, Sir," Novak tells him.

He grimaces as the pills go down. "They already have."

Novak is twitchy, naturally caffeinated. She hiccups when nervous and is obviously a little uneasy speaking so frankly to her superior, judging from her several attempts to hold her breath to calm her hitching diaphragm. It is obvious, as well, that she doesn't give a shit and is as tired of chasing ghosts as he is. She absently fiddles with a plastic coffee stirrer but speaks without hesitation.

"We are using too much technology to pursue the signal," she says.

"Go on," he responds.

"Every time we get the signal, we move in on it. The Daedalus is a huge ship. Its sensor activity is easily detected by scanners in the areas we are searching. We need to think smaller."

"And that means…?"

"A jumper. We exit hyperspace far distant from the signal. Send out a cloaked jumper with supplies to last until they reach the signal's location. If it's on a planet, land the jumper close but not too close, then send out an armed foot team on the planet surface."

"A jumper and foot team could be out there for weeks."

Novak has bent and twisted the stirrer around her fingers. With a small gesture of impatience, she tosses it down on the table in front of her. "Tough. I'll go myself, if you want. Take a couple of other people and pack the jumper to the ceiling with supplies."

Caldwell considers what Novak has said. He finishes his coffee, gets up and pours himself another cup. His hands shake, but not from the coffee. His hands shake because this is a good idea.

OoOoO

John Sheppard stands in the visiting place, waiting for them to bring Teyla. This is the first time he's been allowed to see her since McKay left ten days ago. After they use the machine on him, John experiences odd dreams in which Pistoule towers over him, hands him books and small devices and takes hold of John's childlike hands.

Teyla is brought to her side of the room. She is in full-blown distress, the first time that John has ever seen her like this. He gets as close to the shield as he can, so close he feels the energy skimming along the hairs on his arms and legs. She is close, as well, close enough so that, even with the force shield blurring her face, he sees an unmistakable torment in her features.

"Don't feel that way," he tells her, as if it were an order. He doesn't know what Teyla's not telling him, but he can't stand to witness her like this. Not after what he's been trying to do to himself for the past few weeks.

"I do not know where Rodney is. They keep…asking." She uses the word with all of the contempt she can muster and this is not lost on John at all.

"Even if you knew…"

"I would not tell them."

"Same here."

They are being watched and listened to.

"There is hope, John. He got away somehow. He is alive and so are we."

John is painfully aware that he is supposed to be the one giving the pep talk. "I know. I know that. I'm sorry I got us into this mess, Teyla. Once I found out what they were really like, I tried to get us out…"

"You have no reason to apologize. McKay is free."

They know that McKay may actually be dead. They know that the Warden could be messing with their minds with this talk of escape, of rescue.

"He's free," John says after her, wanting to believe that it is true.

He puts his hand up almost touching the shield. Teyla does the same on her side. The energy sizzles between their palms and it kind of hurts and it kind of feels pleasurable. They look directly at each other, feeding and being fed.

The lights go out again. The audio snaps off. He sobs one time and that's all he's going to give up for anyone.

After John has spoken with Teyla, he is returned to his cell. Pistoule next door has become more agitated each day, as John has become more unhinged. It is Pistoule messing with the rattley metal bed, Pistoule grunting and sucking on his fingers.

The air crackles with anticipation while John does pushups and stands on his hands, while he figures math equations in his head and has fantasy conversations with McKay and Teyla and even with Ronon, even though Ronon died.

Sheppard's wrists are bound to the chair with thin metal rings when he is questioned in the Warden's office in the late afternoon.

"Tell me where he is," the Warden says.

"I don't know," Sheppard responds. The stun rod shorts him out for a while. When John comes back to himself, the Warden begins again.

"Who took him?"

"I don't know."

Stun.

"Where is he?"

"I don't know."

Stun.

"Who…"

"I don't know."

Stun.

Sometimes John regains consciousness to see the Warden doing paperwork or eating at his desk. One time he thought that he heard sounds through the door to the next room.

His butt is numb from sitting in the chair for so long. Everything hurts right down to his soul, but they don't kill him.

"You know," says the Warden, rising and coming around to the front of the desk. "Kalian women are not permitted to go into battle."

A disciplinarian brings a drink for the Warden, who waves it in front of Sheppard's face before sipping. He dabs his pink lips with a dainty cloth, then continues.

"We expect our women to make sacrifices of another sort. Sometimes they lose their sons to the cause, or their husbands, fathers or brothers. As a military man, you surely understand what I'm saying."

Sheppard wants the Warden to come closer, so that he can spit on him. That doesn't happen, so he says, "They're not making sacrifices. You're taking, they aren't giving. Where I come from that's called stealing."

A stun rod at the base of his spine makes his legs jerk uncontrollably for several minutes. The Warden speaks through his fog.

"Teyla is unique among the women that I have met," he says.

"Teyla," Sheppard says, taking back possession.

"She is not easy to control, but I have found a way to gain her cooperation. She is willing to make sacrifices to protect you."

John doesn't get it. And then he does. The metal rings dig into his wrists, as he twists in rage.

"I'm going to…"

A stun rod hits John at the base of his skull. He loses control of everything, then.

OoOoO

John wakes up in his cell to the sounds of gunfire and of explosions so close and massive they shake the walls and ceilings and send dust and bits of masonry rattling down onto the floor. A ferocious battle rages, and the shells and missiles and incendiary devices detonating are things with which John is familiar. He wants to be out in the middle of it, doesn't even care who's fighting with whom; he just wants to be out there doing it, maybe getting killed in the process.

Running footfalls on the metal walkway come closer and then stop in front of Pistoule's cell.

"Come, my friend!" says a pained voice. "It is I, Nevillus! Do you not remember?"

The shield to Pistoule's cell cuts off with a snap. John hears the little man resisting, whimpering confusedly but unable to launch a strong protest.

John took a stun rod to the base of the skull. His muscles don't obey him, his mouth opens but only some breath emerges. He wants to call out, to be whisked away into the night with Pistoule. After what he endured today, and the day before and the day before that, he deserves to be set free. He and Teyla. Teyla…

Outside the building, more explosions light up the sky. John imagines himself flying away through the flak, through clouds, high, high into perfect black of space. Pistoule is gone, saved. It could happen to John, to Teyla, the same way, perhaps later this night.

Once the fighting stops, the prison is so completely quiet that John believes he can hear the scurry of crickroaches inside the masonry walls, where they like to congregate when frightened.

He stays awake for the rest of the night, anticipating more interesting loud stuff, but nothing like that happens. At dawn, as he is finally sliding off to sleep, a half-dozen disciplinarians come to his cell and, even though John still can't move, they stun him until he passes out. He awakens strapped to the chair in the center of the Warden's office, which looks as if it were ransacked by a dozen crazed looters.

After a while, the Warden enters from the hallway and quietly closes the door. He is disheveled and his hands are balled into tiny, fat fists, his knuckles blanching bloodlessly whiter than his skin. With deliberate steps, he stands in front of John. This is the closest he has ever come, having relied exclusively on the disciplinarians to violate the man for him.

The Warden holds a stun rod. He seems uncomfortable handling it, like a badminton player wielding a baseball bat. When he touches John with the rod, they both flinch.

"What!" John shrinks away.

"You know what I'm going to ask you."

"I don't." And he really doesn't because, after the shit that went down the night before, the Warden is unlikely to still be interested in McKay.

Another little nudge and it feels like needles and the cast-off from sparklers too close to his skin.

"Tell me."

"I don't know what you want to know. Maybe…" he tries a grin, friendly and rational. "Maybe if you put it in the form of a complete sentence, I could help you. Wadda ya say?"

A longer jolt, and John feels the hair stand up on top of his head. He is left panting and shaking, but at least his hair is back to normal.

"If you don't tell me, I will kill you."

The Warden looks awfully angry. John has tried to kill himself many times. He is a triple loser, with "multiple failed suicide attempts" behind him, and is pleased that finally someone will devote the necessary effort towards doing it for him once and for all.

Ronon is dead. Rodney is dead or rescued. John's been sticking around for Teyla. If he weren't around any longer, she wouldn't feel obligated to continue making her sacrifice. John takes a moment to regret every bad thing he's ever done, the worst being wishing to die when members of his team were depending on him.

Then the Warden comes nose to nose with him and, in a moment of accidental irony, says the only words that will let John die in peace.

The Warden says, "She is gone. And you know who took her."

TBC…


	7. Part 1, Chapter 7

**_A/N:_ **_The alert bots are down, so if you are waiting for update information, it's not getting to you. To reiterate, I will be posting roughly every other day, as final edits are completed. Again, my deepest thanks to feedbackers and others who have given their support throughout the writing, editing and posting of this long labor of love._

**Part 1, Chapter Seven**

"They will kill him! There is no reason not to, now!" Teyla glares at Ronon, who sits across from her in the small transport vehicle, both arms guarding his belly. He is sweating from pain. Exertion like this still bothers him. The pain will subside in a few moments, but he can't deal with her anger until it does. Nevillus has an arm over Ronon's shoulders, trying to get him to sit up a little.

"We'll go back," he hisses, as Nevillus lifts his shirt away. "You'll come with us." He offers this last to make her feel better right now. He has no intention of allowing her into battle for a good long time.

Pistoule sits opposite them, tended by another man and a woman. Two other cloaked space vehicles travel with Ronon's. All three are old and rickety; their engines shake with a palsy of age. The rebellion has very little money behind it. Homemade explosives and rusting ships are typical, but even they are hard to come by.

The woman with Pistoule approaches Nevillus.

"He is as we feared," she says, her eyes brimming with tears. She notices Ronon. "Does he need anything?" she asks offhandedly, as if she doesn't really care, as if Pistoule is everything.

"See to Pistoule," Nevillus answers.

The pain loosens its grip on Ronon, so he sits straighter. His bones have knitted fine but sometimes his belly gives him trouble. In a minute he will have to deal with Teyla, who is waiting for him to answer her, waiting for answers, period.

Teyla is thinner than before, almost wiry. She has a feral look about her, quick and vicious.

"You should have taken John instead," she says, her eyes narrow with fury. Her voice sounds harsh as she strains to be heard above the engine noise. "How is it that with so many fighters, you could not find him but you found this…"—and she gestures towards Pistoule, who whimpers and drools—"…man," she finishes.

Nevillus speaks. "He is our leader."

This means nothing to Teyla, Ronon knows. Leave it to Nevillus to pick the wrong time to try to get her to care. Again, she confronts him. "You come in with explosives and so many fighters and then leave John behind?"

Before Ronon can respond, the small man answers for him. "We did not know the location of your friend's cell, only Pistoule's. Pistoule is famous. Understand, we did what we could."

This is not the reunion that Ronon was hoping for. Teyla is not herself, which comes as no surprise, considering what McKay's told him of their captivity, considering where he found her and what a half-failed mission like this means for Sheppard. He tries to bring her down a little anyway. "McKay is safe, you're safe. We'll find Sheppard next."

Hearing McKay's name stops her cold. She looks at Ronon, as if seeing him for the first time, and lets her shoulders bend.

He wants to say a great many things, but this isn't the time. So he tells her, "We'll try again. Next time we'll bring him out."

"How do you know?"

Ronon doesn't know. He is fueled by nothing more than the tenacious faith that Sheppard has instilled in him. This is not enough to comfort Teyla, so he says, "Trust me," and hopes that she still does.

OoOoO

The little cloaked ship speeds away from Kali's moon. They are leaving John behind. He has no one there who cares about him. Every mile stretches to infinity as far as Teyla is concerned.

"Fine. Go back for John today. Go now," she says.

"We can't. Not yet."

"Do you know what they will _do_ to him? They used a machine on him…" she rubs her face and pushes her hair off her forehead, trying to control her temper.

The little man seated next to Ronon looks up sharply at hearing mention of the machine but says nothing.

She has raised her voice. Pistoule reacts by flinging his arms around and screeching. Teyla looks over at him. It's too much for her. She folds her hands on the back of her neck and pulls her head down into her lap, to hide.

Ronon knows. He found her there, hastily dressing as explosions in the hallways and Play Yard shook the room and spilled flaking paint onto the bed sheets. The Warden ran to his safety bunker, left her there amid the chaos. Ronon and a ground unit came looking for the Warden, but they found Teyla instead.

There was no time to dress completely, so she grabbed her trousers and boots and used a sheet to cover herself. Disciplinarians and insurgents alike lay dead in the hallways and on the flight tarmac. Ronon urged her to hurry, said that their weapons were spent. So Teyla rushed to the transport vehicle, expecting to see the Colonel there.

He wasn't. He is still in the prison, left to suffer for her release as they together suffered for Rodney's salvation. The horror of knowing what will happen to John grinds her into dust.

The sheet lies in a heap on the floor next to her, now that Teyla is dressed. Looking at it makes her feel sick. Ronon watches her closely.

"I do not wish to speak of it," she says, her voice muffled against her knees.

"Don't have to," her friend responds.

After a while, Teyla raises her head. Ronon sits not two feet from her. Scars track up his arms and around the side of his bald head. She noticed the one on his belly when his shirt was raised. Ronon's been through it just like the rest of them.

Ronon hands her some water.

"Rodney?" she asks, taking a swig from the can.

"He's been sick. It's a little better, now."

The vision of Ronon lying broken and dead is replaced by the living man with her now. Teyla thinks that this may be a wishing dream. She embraces him and leans her head against his shoulder. He feels real enough. Her tears roll down his skin.

"Thank you," she says. He doesn't seem to mind her shakes and sniffles, just enfolds her in his body.

Pistoule makes snuffling noises, little yips and animal calls. The woman who has been with him comes to Teyla with a pill in one hand and a small flask in the other.

Teyla looks up at Ronon because she can't think for herself right this minute. Ronon nods and so she takes the pill and drinks the elixir. The woman goes away again. The drugs work quickly. Ronon gathers Teyla to him, rubs his hand up and down her back until she is asleep. He stays that way until they reach the planet, because when Teyla wakes up for a minute upon landing, Ronon is still there, holding on to her.

OoOoO

McKay has been trying to breathe all day. The nurse who delivered his morning meal said that the doctor wanted to skip a dose of the black tablets to see how he does. McKay has seen a doctor one time, a Dr. Mann, who listened to his lungs and made him blow into a tube. This was pretty soon after Rodney arrived here, when he was still sleeping and passing out a lot.

"You have the lungs of an old man," the doctor said.

"How old?" asked McKay. "Old like forty or old like eighty?"

Dr. Mann said, "Old like you will never be young again."

McKay had thought himself to be rather on the youthful side. Not yet forty, not yet going grey. The doctor's news wasn't particularly good, but it was better than what the doctor at the moon clinic had told him, better than hearing that he was dying.

Ronon spends every minute plotting and planning and going over maps of the prison interior with the Kalians he's fallen in with. On several occasions, Nevillus has come by seeking information on how to make improvised explosive devices, or curious about the chemical components of gunpowder. Normally, McKay would be reluctant to provide this information, but he knows that whatever mission is being planned to rescue Sheppard and Teyla may require it. Ronon spends time with Nevillus, who likes to touch and stroke and who looks at Ronon with more adoration than McKay ever felt for Sam Carter.

This is an exhausting day. The nurse tries to get McKay to walk a little to the Kalian version of a bathroom, a large, private area appointed with all manner of disinfectants and a vast array of tools for cleaning various body parts. McKay was wheeled in there the day before. Several hours later, he emerged spotless and sanitized and hairless, again, as well.

Effort and anxiety make McKay break into a sweat. His chest feels tight, as if someone were squeezing his lungs.

"I…need…" he begins, rubbing his sternum.

The nurse looks at him questioningly, which is very annoying. He needs to take in air, like anyone else. He needs his teammates. He needs to get home.

He pulls back and stops, panting in short, sharp gasps. After a while, he feels better.

"Can you go on?" asks the nurse.

McKay thinks that this question has answers on many levels.

It takes a long time to reach the bath. The nurse becomes almost insanely impatient, which amuses him. Now that he's awake, McKay is bored a lot of the time.

In the late evening, as McKay is dozing off from the sleeping pills he's been given, a commotion begins in the hallway. Someone makes howling noises; there's a scuffle. A wild-looking man with long, stringy hair and ratty clothing bursts into the ward, trips on his own feet and falls to the floor. He is followed in by Nevillus and a couple of other people who McKay doesn't know. The wild man scurries on the floor, trying to escape or hide. Nevillus kneels in front of him, speaking softly, stroking his tangled hair.

It takes a few minutes, but the wild man calms. He is lifted onto a bed. A half-dozen nurses attend to him, cutting off his filthy clothing, washing his body and shaving his beard and matted hair. The wild man is skinny, skinny like McKay was when he was brought in. He looks cadaver-like when shaved and McKay notices a couple of moles on his scalp and a few small scars, as well.

Within a short time, the wild man is clean, hairless and sleeping peacefully. That is when the doors to the ward swing open again and Ronon enters carrying Teyla Emmagen. She is mostly asleep, boneless as Ronon stands her before McKay's bed.

She looks at McKay with bleary eyes and smiles drunkenly, then sits heavily beside him and falls forward onto his chest.

McKay looks at Ronon. "Sedatives," says the Runner. "She's fine."

"Teyla?" asks McKay, uncomfortable having a grown person pressing down on him. He grabs Teyla's shoulders and pushes up, but can't hold her for long. "Give me a hand here, Ronon," he says. Ronon complies. McKay wishes that his teammate would wipe that grin off his face.

"You rescued her?" he asks. Ronon nods. "Sheppard?"

"Next time," the big man says. "Teyla will sleep until morning."

With that, he picks her up and carries her off, presumably to a bed of her own.

When Ronon comes back, McKay looks at him with a steady gaze. "Next time is when?"

"You can't come. You know that."

"I could stay low. I'll offer moral support. I can _fix_ something!"

"No."

"Ronon…"

"No."

Their eyes lock. They aren't angry with each other, though. McKay looks away first.

"I want to do something to help," he says.

"You have," Ronon responds. Then he makes a quiet blowing-up gesture with his arms. "Boom," he says, without mirth.

Nevillus, who has been completely absorbed in the task of assisting with the wild man's care, walks over to McKay. His sleeves are wet from wiping away tears.

"I am sorry for the commotion," the Kalian says. He nods towards the wild man. "This is Dinstard Pistoule, the one we hold most high in our efforts to free our world of tyranny."

"That?"

Nevillus winces. He looks back over his shoulder at the thin man sleeping soundly.

"He was once our most brilliant physicist. His theories rose above everything we knew about our world, about the things that are all around us. But he challenged the ideas long held by the government, ideas about matter and science, certainly, but also about freedom and truth and justice. So he was jailed in the moon prison, where they tried to change his ways of thinking. The methods they use can do this…" He raises his chin towards Pistoule, tears beginning to fall once again.

"Is it treatable? Curable?"

"We do not know. Our network of compatriots includes many doctors. One believes that she may have a workable treatment. Once our beloved Pistoule is made physically healthy again, we will begin treating him for the damage done to his mind."

McKay understands what is happening, now. He feels more sad than uncomfortable when he sees the tiny man sleeping there.

"Goodnight, Dr. McKay," says Nevillus. "You and your friend Teyla will be reunited in the morning."

A nurse sits next to the sleeping Pistoule, someone to watch over him should he wake in the night.

Ronon lingers nearby. McKay asks him, "Is Dr. Pistoule really that special?"

"From what I'm told, he's their you," Ronon replies.

OoOoO

Teyla wakes to several nurses standing beside her bed armed with shaving equipment and disinfectants. For a second, as the sedatives wear off, she feels her hair being lifted, and cool hands fingering her skin. Fortunately, the razor blades never even come close to touching her, for in a flash she is up, ready to kill, waiting for a stun rod to make her stupid and compliant. The nurses scatter like insects whose nest has been disturbed.

"Teyla!" Ronon brings her back to herself. He moves quickly to stand before her.

It takes a few seconds for her to remember what has happened. The rescue, hours in the stuffy transport. Then she hazily recollects being placed on the soft bed and it's not in the Warden's room and the people with her do not want to do her harm.

Once her heart has stopped banging in her chest, she relaxes out of the attack stance she had taken. Ronon is close.

"I am fine," she tells him. "They surprised me."

"Nevillus told the nurses to leave you alone." He smiles. "Don't worry. I'll protect you from them!"

Ronon shows her across the way to the ward where McKay is resting.

"He tried to walk over to see you earlier," Ronon tells her.

When the swinging door opens, Teyla sees Rodney for just a second, and then puts her hands up and turns away. She stays in the hallway, collecting herself.

McKay is sleeping when Teyla finally approaches him. His cheeks are almost as hollow as last she saw them in the prison's visiting place. The sunlight on him makes shadows where he has become narrow and wasted away. His breaths are noisy, but deep and regular, better than the last time she heard them through the cell wall. When she touches him, McKay opens his eyes and looks at her. She smiles encouragingly, but can't hold it for long.

"Oh, I'm so glad…" McKay says, but he doesn't finish because he is overcome.

Teyla doesn't say anything at all, just embraces him, feeling his bones through his skin.

He holds his head on her shoulder while Teyla rubs his back.

"John and I did not know what happened to you. We thought that you may have died."

"Ronon," McKay says, a complete answer.

"I know."

"I had help," Ronon interjects. Teyla looks at the Satedan. Too much history passes between them. She awoke briefly in the nighttime to see Nevillus speaking quietly with Ronon, holding a caressing hand to Ronon's cheek.

"Yes, yes," McKay seems unable to help himself. "No one…" and then he coughs "…thinks that…single-handedly…" and then he coughs more.

Teyla holds Rodney a little more loosely as his lungs calm a bit.

_She sees him standing down in the Play Yard as the Warden whispers in her ear, "I want you to cooperate, even if your commander dies…"_

"What?" asks McKay, as her body responds to these terrible memories. He pulls away and looks at her, wiping his eyes to clear them.

"Nothing," she says, realizing that sometimes she's as bad a liar as McKay.

McKay's reunion with Teyla makes him struggle against his illness. He holds his chest and coughs and the worry she feels brings tears to Teyla's eyes.

"S-sorry," he manages, dragging in a half-lungful of air.

"Fungus or something," Ronon tells Teyla, as he pushes a pillow behind Rodney's back to help him sit straighter.

A nurse dashes over with a black pill, which he takes. The noise in his lungs lessens. When the coughing abates, Ronon, Teyla and Rodney sit together on Rodney's bed, each deeply aware of who is missing.

"He has been left behind," Teyla says, trying to stay calm to spare Rodney another attack.

Ronon crosses his arms defensively. "That was not our intention."

"Intent does not concern me. Please, Ronon." It comes out as begging, as if she needs to ask permission to save John's life.

"Too soon. He's still alive. Nevillus would have received word if he were dead."

"We must return for him today."

"Not yet."

"Tomorrow!"

"No."

"Do not _tell_ me what to do!"

It comes out of her so fast that everyone, including Teyla herself, is shocked. A rip in her perennial patience and all of the bad stuff pours through.

McKay's eyes widen and his breathing roughs up again.

"Oh, no…" Teyla says, looking around for a nurse to help him. "I am sorry, Rodney."

He waves his hand to let her know that he's okay and lets her rub his back some more. In a minute, he is better.

"When?" she asks Ronon.

"Soon," he replies.

TBC…


	8. Part 1, Chapter 8

**Part 1, Chapter Eight**

Elizabeth's hands shake. She wonders how this thing got away from her. Carson has noticed and is hint-dropping like a rain shower, suggesting that she may want to visit Earth sometime soon, that perhaps a rest will do her some good. In a short while, he will insist about things and won't that be a mess, then.

There aren't any patients in the infirmary when she enters. Carson isn't around, either. A nurse works over in the supply area, counting non-rebreathers and rolls of kling. If Elizabeth is very convincing, she may be able to con the nurse out of a single dose...but it's not very likely. They go by protocol; nurses can't dispense meds, sedatives especially.

Carson strolls in, looking annoyingly fit and happy. He stops when he sees Elizabeth, then motions towards his office, where they sit across from each other at the desk.

"I just want one. To help me sleep."

"Elizabeth…"

"Just…one. For tonight, because I can't sleep."

"No."

"I've been seeing Kate Heightmeyer. Go on, ask her. I've been seeing her two, three times a week. She'll tell you that I'm much better when I've had enough sleep."

"It's for your own good. I can't…"

"Five months, Carson. Every lead has turned up empty."

He doesn't say anything because this conversation hardly needs to be repeated. Sheppard's team is as gone for him as it is for Elizabeth and for everyone else.

"Don't sleep," he tells her. She looks up from her fidgeting hands.

"What are you talking about? I have to sleep."

"You're coming down off some strong meds. I told you that you might experience sleeplessness for several days or weeks. I should have never prescribed them for you in the first place, but I had no idea you'd take them all so quickly."

"I have to sleep."

"You'll sleep, eventually. I've treated problems like this before. Fortunately you're not a long-term heavy user."

"User," she repeats. This is going nowhere.

"I'm not trying to be cruel, you know. I'm trying to help you."

She gives him a tight little smile, because she's angry with him and because she knows that he's not going to give in and loves him for it.

The hallways of Atlantis are quiet. The day has ended for many people; they are in their quarters playing musical instruments, reading, doing yoga. Before all of this, Elizabeth used to relax at night, as well.

The last time Elizabeth slept well without help was the night after John's last contact with Atlantis.

He sent a message via the gate, "The Kalians are acting weird." She laughed and shared the message with Lorne when he showed up for duty that day. Her response was so perfectly blithe that it pains her to think about it, now.

She replied, "They have the tech we need. Don't leave until you get it."

She hadn't meant it that way. Yes, the Kalians had cold fusion. McKay was very excited about it. Cold fusion and cool this and cooler that. A trade agreement would be a crowning achievement. The military types and bean counters breathing down Elizabeth's neck would praise her leadership, even if on occasion John Sheppard or Teyla Emmagen or someone equally skilled negotiated for her.

The next day, the wormhole hung there promisingly for a minute, then blinked out. The jumper and the people in it were gone.

When Elizabeth tries to blame Sheppard for being vague, she ends up blaming herself because perhaps he hadn't had a choice and, more to the point, perhaps she hadn't been clever enough to read between the lines.

The jumper's locator beacon bounces around the galaxy. It is a wild goose, a red herring, driving Elizabeth Weir to distraction.

Heightmeyer talks about guilt. It's more than that. It is culpability, which drives itself much deeper.

Radek Zelenka is in his lab when Elizabeth ends up there. She ends up there quite often these days. McKay preferred keeping to himself when he was working, but Radek seems to like occasional interruptions.

She watches him for a moment before making her presence known. His white lab coat strains across the back, now. He seems unaware of how compact and solid he's become. When he sees her, Zelenka motions to a seat across the table from him. Elizabeth sits down there. He writes something on a lined tablet, looks over at his calculator and punches in some numbers. His laptop is open and his glasses reflect the screen.

Without looking up, he says, "Can't sleep?"

Elizabeth says, "As usual."

"I'll be up quite late. You may stay here as long as you wish."

She sits and plays Minesweeper and Solitaire on one of the computer workstations. Elizabeth will sleep when she can't keep her eyes open any longer, instead of when the drugs let her rest.

This is her punishment, she supposes. Something similar happened during negotiations during the Bosnian War. She was only a minor player in that, but she heard testimonies of torture, of women being raped until they died. Disturbing photographs depicted the carnage, ghastly and pathetic and yet so typical of what happens when human beings turn on each other.

The interminable wait for dawn ends when Elizabeth places her head in her arms. She doesn't notice Zelenka move the laptop out of her way, doesn't see him standing beside her in the dim light watching her breathe. Neither does she stir when Radek turns off the lamp and leaves. He is wise to not wake her. In a few hours, she is up, showered, dressed and in her office, again, a little jumpy from coffee and nerves.

A message from the Daedalus comes through subspace. The beacon has moved to another location and the ship will follow. This is alternately heartening and frightening. There's always hope, Zelenka tells her every day, but it's not as if Caldwell hasn't sent similar messages many times before.

"Send a response. Instruct the Daedalus to come home," she tells the tech.

The tech pauses and looks at her.

"Ask Colonel Caldwell to return to Atlantis immediately, where he can make preparations before continuing on to Earth."

Within two minutes, Caldwell is going verbal, even though there may be Wraith about, even though subspace is safer and more private.

"How's your back feeling?" she says, certain that if he could jump, Caldwell absolutely would jump at the chance to return to the Milky Way.

"Dr. Weir, we're not coming back to Atlantis, yet. Novak's hit on an idea that's already been initiated. We're going to follow it through before leaving this part of the galaxy."

Caldwell doesn't elaborate and Elizabeth doesn't ask him to. They've both had their share of disappointments during the past five months. None of their clever ideas has panned out, so neither he nor Elizabeth will discuss this one until Caldwell writes his report documenting its failure.

"How long, then?" she asks.

"Are you giving up?"

"No. I think that we need a break, though. A short one."

She sees Caldwell nodding in her mind. He's been out there week after week. His back must be killing him.

"We'll be in contact once this project is complete."

"Understood." Four or five months ago, Elizabeth would have been practically jumping out of her skin in anticipation, gushing effusively, wishing Caldwell and his crew success, Godspeed and everything else. Today she says a simple "Send a databurst with the details. Good luck," and lets that be it.

Databurst received, Elizabeth asks that it be transferred to Zelenka's workstation node. Then she goes to her office.

The daily duty roster lies on her desk, listing everyone presently assigned to the Atlantis mission. On the bottom it reads:

Sheppard J, LtCol: MIA

McKay R: MIA

Dex R: MIA

Emmagen T: MIA

OoOoO

John sleeps more than he did before, now that noisy Pistoule isn't waking him up several times each night. He dreams about Pistoule a lot. They play games or have quiet meals together. When John wins a game, Pistoule claps his hands and laughs delightedly. John finds these dreams oddly comforting.

When he's awake, John stands out in the Play Yard or eats his food or watches crickroaches, which eat crumbs off the floor like tiny squirrels, standing up, with their front legs holding the food to their toothy, tonguey mouths.

After dozens of sessions with the machine, John feels confused most of the time and relaxes by rocking and by sucking on the back of his hand.

A few nights after Teyla's beautiful liberation, Rodney appears in Sheppard's cell. He leans against the shield as fizzy bluish-green static charges bounce off his torso. He smiles benevolently, arms folded across his chest, as Sheppard describes the best pork barbeque he's ever eaten. He ate it a day after returning from Afghanistan while out with his last two friends in the world, one of whom died a week later during an armed robbery, shot through the chest for $24 and an expired Visa card.

"That was Baker's Last Supper, I guess you could say. One hell of a good plate of barbeque. Wish I had some right now."

"Me, too," Rodney responds. "Speaking of last suppers, the food here sucks. I don't know why you bother."

John looks up at his fantasized Rodney. "Last I saw, you were pretty slim yourself."

Rodney unfolds him arms and links his hands behind his back, completely relaxed in his usual stiff, unrelaxed way. "In my case, it was unintentional, but still. Consider the alternative."

"You're right, as usual, Rodney."

Fantasy McKay smiles crookedly and cocks his head. "As usual. So, starting today you think?"

"Sure. Why not."

The Warden hasn't followed through on his death threat, which makes John very unhappy. Now that he doesn't have to worry about Rodney or Teyla, John wants to free himself. Nothing he's tried has worked yet to accomplish his goal. His life hangs on tenaciously, as if it had value.

Now McKay has come up with a viable solution. Thank God for geniuses! They let McKay starve; John is confident that he can starve, as well.

The doctor at the clinic tells John that depression is a side-effect of the machine. This answers John's questions about why he's been rather in love with the idea of suicide. All hope for himself vanished a long time ago.

After refusing food for three days, John is too weak to exercise in his cell. He falls down when attempting handstands. His arms collapse under him and he lies there, with his cheek pressed against the cold stone floor. It takes a half hour to get onto the bed, where he shakes from his efforts.

McKay appears. He wins two fantasy card games. He and John reminisce for a while about some of the hairier missions they went on together. Even though he's sitting down, John gets dizzy, weary from denying himself sustenance. He becomes too tired to maintain his side of the conversation with McKay, so the physicist begins to fade out.

"Don't miss me," John tells his friend.

"We won't," says McKay, but John knows that he's lying and feels guilty all over again.

When John lies down on his cot, he dreams of nothing and dreams that this is what death is like.

Four days into John's fast, the Warden pays a surprise visit to his cell. He has stopped torturing John with the stun rod, trying to find out where Teyla has gone. Now the time seems to have come for a talk.

"My office is still being renovated," he says, seating himself on the bed, as a half-dozen disciplinarians pin John against the wall. The Warden's belly is so large it lies atop his thighs. "Your friends destroyed many of my personal items and stole something that is precious to me."

"Well, they aren't my friends, but I agree with their methods."

"I should have you down there painting, getting stains out of the bed sheets."

"Go to hell!" He tries to swing up his legs to kick the Warden's teeth down his throat, but the disciplinarians hold him tightly.

"I'm told that you're refusing to eat. Is this true?"

John doesn't say anything. This is his business; it's private.

"If you keep this up, you will not be strong enough when someone comes to your rescue."

Again, John refuses to respond. He is half starved but feels at his moment as if he could live off his rage alone for days to come.

"If you do not eat, I will have you sent to the clinic. There you will be sedated and fed through a tube. Unless you change your mind, right here and right now."

Although he thinks that this might be a good time to say something, it is also one of the few times in his life that John is too stunned to respond.

"Then you have decided for yourself. We will continue trying to convince you of the peace you will find in walking our path. We'll use the machine again and again until you do."

The Air Force Colonel who has faced down Wraith and selflessly protected his country, his city and his people, is pulled away from the wall and, still held tightly, let to stand once again.

"Why?" he whispers, trying to keep from looking as forlorn as he feels.

The Warden comes so very close that John can smell the perfumed soap the little man uses to bathe. "Someone will try to rescue you. I want to kill them just when they believe that they have succeeded."

"No one's coming for me." And he really believes this, and yet he can't fathom where such a ludicrous, loser, failure idea came from.

The fat man laughs. He sounds a little wheezy, sort of like Rodney the last time he heard him speak. "How will it feel to see your friends die attempting to save you?"

John shakes his head. Ronon is dead. McKay is sick, at best. Teyla, if she has any brains at all, won't come back to this place for anything. He wishes he'd told her—ordered her—to just keep on running if she ever got free.

"In the meantime, with your assistance, we will continue our research into the machine's operation." He turns to the disciplinarians. "Take him."

The disciplinarians stun John a couple of times to make him placid. He wakes in the clinic to find his wrists and ankles bound to the bed with soft restraints. A nurse starts an IV and then the doctor comes up and administers a strong sedative.

Another pause in his life…

Then he slowly comes back to consciousness and looks around. A clear bag hangs up over his head. It contains a thick, grayish-beige substance, which runs down a thin cannula and enters John's body through a small surgical port in his gut.

"This is terrible," he slurs, horrified that he will be like this forever, that he will never die. He tries to reach the tube, to pull it out and stop all of this madness.

There is the doctor, again, holding a syringe. He injects its contents into John's IV. John closes his eyes and sees Ronon fall from the jumper, Rodney lying unconscious in the clinic. He sees Teyla holding her hand to the force shield, and the last thing that the Colonel thinks is, "Don't come back."

TBC…


	9. Part 1, Chapter 9

**_A/N:_** _Deepest thanks to my ingenius betas, Klostes, Pranksta and Aslowhite. I'd also like to thank those of you who have provided feedback. I am grateful for your support._

**Part 1, Chapter Nine**

Kali is home to some beautiful weather. Ronon, Teyla and McKay sit beneath an _odesin_ tree not far from the Institute, eating its ripe, pear-like fruit. A gentle breeze blows around lush grasses that carpet the expansive, tree-dotted field that surrounds the Institute. Nevillus isn't there, but he packed a basket with meat, breads and drinks and gave it to Ronon so he and his friends could eat together outside.

Included in the basket is a book written by Dinstard Pistoule titled _The Known World_, in which the Kalian treasure writes about physics, philosophy and the beauty of personal expression and individuality. McKay thinks that this is the best book he has ever read.

"'We learn by observation'," McKay reads. "'As our society loses its variety, as the arts are denied a place in our schools and the sciences are restricted to what is already revealed, we begin to forget how to see, how to question and how to grow as a species'."

They are silent for a few moments, until McKay reaches for another fruit and a flask of water.

McKay says, "Pistoule is Thoreau. He's also Newton and Einstein."

"He's almost nothing, now," says Ronon.

McKay pauses for a second, then continues eating.

"Dr. Pistoule is getting stronger," Teyla says. She has been quiet this day, which is usual for her lately. "He has gained weight. The doctors will soon begin working to restore his mind."

"I wonder what Pistoule will say about his experiences in prison," McKay muses, caressing the page from which he has just read. "Assuming he remembers anything, that is. Speaking of which, Teyla…"

"You want more water?" Ronon hands him a flask.

McKay looks at him quizzically and indicates the full container in his hand. He waves away the offering. "You've noticed that I'm capable of watering myself, now, haven't you?" Teyla and Ronon exchange a look. McKay has noticed them doing this a number of times, and it bothers him.

"The doctors are hopeful," Teyla murmurs.

"Yes, I'm sure they are." McKay can't help feeling irritated. "And I'm also certain that they wouldn't say so if they were not. After all, everyone's so open and honest here, aren't they?"

Ronon drinks from the flask. "It's a screwed-up society, McKay. Hardly anybody talks about how they really feel."

"So I've noticed," he says, flipping closed Pistoule's wonderful book and slowly climbing to his feet. "And apparently you two have taken the local customs to heart. Or perhaps I didn't get the memo on Teyla and Ronon's backstory."

They look at McKay with guarded expressions. "Okay. Whatever. When you're ready to fill me in, I'll be around."

This is a while after Teyla's rescue. McKay's lungs are still tired and old-feeling, but he takes walks and, when no one's looking, bobs around in the exercise pool just outside the main Institute building. Since he's annoyed, McKay feels like striding away from his teammates, but can't move that swiftly, yet. Instead, he clutches _The Known World_ to his chest and makes his way back to his room with careful steps.

So much conspires against him. An outing several days ago to the crash site revealed that the jumper had been removed from its resting place in the distant forest.

"The government must have taken it," Nevillus said. "They may suspect that you will return here, so we must not linger!"

McKay was dismayed. He hoped to fix the craft or obtain the transmitter beacon. More than anything, he wanted to be useful again. The journey to the crash site exhausted him. He returned to the Institute with nothing to show for his efforts, fell into bed and slept for 12 hours.

Eight days later, the morning of their picnic, a message came through from Nevillus's contact, a lone employee within the prison friendly to their cause, saying that Sheppard is gravely ill and must be extracted with all due speed. Many schemes to gain Sheppard's release have been drawn up and scrapped since Teyla's rescue. Even now they have only the flimsiest contrivance and barest supplies with which to work.

Ronon refused to allow Teyla and McKay to accompany him back to the moon.

He said, "I have enough manpower. I don't need either of you."

Teyla, prickling with outrage, stood her ground and told him, "I will be going. You will not stop me."

Ronon looked at Teyla and tipped his head towards Rodney. "McKay's sick. He can't come."

In the silent moment that followed, Rodney saw their glances, as swift and as telling as so many of late, but these were different. The mission could fail. Rodney felt orphaned, already, like Teyla, like Ronon and, for all he know, like Sheppard, as well.

"You should ask him what he wants," Teyla said, as she and Ronon glared at each other.

"You need to stay here with him," Ronon replied, struggling to control his words.

Rodney protested, said he was fine to go, that he wanted to go. Neither the Athosian nor the Satedan appeared to have heard him, as they were caught in a staring contest, arguing loudly without uttering a single word.

Finally, Ronon relented. Still angry, he stomped away, leaving Teyla standing there clenching and unclenching her fists.

Their picnic signaled a truce. The trio wanted to share a meal together—possibly their last—and McKay is sorry to ruin it. Ronon and Teyla will be leaving the next morning to rescue Sheppard. This is not a good time for taking umbrage.

OoOoO

Eighteen hours later, McKay crouches inside an aging prison transport unit. It had malfunctioned earlier in the day and, as it is crucial to the execution of the rescue, he has secured a place on board in exchange for fixing the problem and ensuring that it stays fixed. Ronon isn't happy about this at all, and he's gone to the trouble of forcing McKay into a protective vest, padding for his elbows and knees, and other gear, including a heavy, hard-form helmet that smells of old sweat.

Teyla spent the pre-dawn hours alternately meditating and stretching and running out to the end of the grassy field and back again. Once inside the ship, she keeps asking McKay if he is feeling up to all of this.

"Wouldn't miss it for the world," he says, which doesn't really answer her question.

Rodney's rescue was a stroke of luck. Teyla and Pistoule were freed by force. No one knows exactly how it will go with Sheppard.

Nevillus comes aboard the transport, bringing with him Lomis and Munn, who work with him at the Institute. He sits beside Rodney, who is pulling together a toolkit to take with him.

"I am sorry that we must leave so suddenly," the Kalian says. "Our friend in the prison was vague about your commander's condition. They know only that something is being done to him and he can no longer be expected to wait for rescue."

Rodney looks up, as another jolt of worry lances through him. "Of course you can't be more specific," he grumbles.

The literal-minded Nevillus fails to hear the sarcasm in McKay's voice.

"The machine," he answers.

"What about it?"

"We don't know where it came from or exactly what it does. It was tried on others so that they would come back and extol the beauty and kindness of the government. Perhaps they wished for your Colonel to believe this so that he would make your world similar to ours."

McKay grabs a large duffle, the one that contains the black pills that he's been taking and other medical supplies. "Sheppard doesn't have that much authority. None of us do. We agreed to share information, that's all."

He pauses as he tries to bring down his heart rate. All of this suffering, theirs, Sheppard's, for nothing.

"Why did your people elect these idiots?" he says, shoving the duffle to the side.

Nevillus blinks at him. "Elect?"

Ronon enters the transport carrying additional supplies, a few weapons among them. He drops his load and crouches in front of McKay.

"It's a bad plan, but it's all we got," he tells him.

McKay looks at him resignedly, because nothing will ever surprise him again. With an eye roll he says all that he needs to.

Ronon continues. "The Resistance did good getting you, Teyla and Pistoule. But there's only couple of guns left and just this one ship." He lays a hand on Rodney's shoulder. "We don't know what's going to happen, McKay. Keep your helmet on and stay low."

Teyla's anxiety is so strong, McKay feels it radiating from her as she listens to Ronon and Nevillus go over the plan. Ronon is calm, but then he was never held prisoner on the moon. He doesn't have memories of that to poison his confidence, but he keeps a close eye on the jittery Teyla who does. McKay takes one of the pills and tries to silence his own wheezing breaths.

The transport is an older unit that was put out of service years before. Nevillus and the few other Kalians with him believe that no one guarding the prison will expect rebels in disguise to release Sheppard using an old transport ship. McKay shakes his head. He's glad that no one on this world has ever heard of a Trojan horse.

OoOoO

En route to the moon, no one speaks very much.

A few minutes from their destination, McKay's stomach begins flipping around. He's not well enough to handle anything terrible.

Ronon and four others are costumed for the mission. Teyla and Nevillus are among those dressed as prisoners. Lomis and Munn have acquired disciplinarian's uniforms. They have volunteered out of gratitude to Ronon, who helped bring back their dear Pistoule. Once inside the jail, they will locate and retrieve Sheppard. No bomb blasts are planned this time. It is a stealth mission, or, at least, it's supposed to be.

The access hatch opens as the transport lands, and everyone except the Kalian pilot and McKay leaves the vehicle. McKay feels his chest tighten up a little bit and breathes slowly, evenly, to keep himself together. He closes the access door, checks the instrument panel for what he's certain is the first of a thousand times.

Then he waits.

OoOoO

Ronon Dex suspects that McKay sabotaged the transport unit just so he'd have to come along to keep it running. He is royally pissed off about this, but has decided to say nothing until they are back on the planet safe and sound. He walks from the idling transport and crosses the landing area.

Kalians use stun rods for close-contact battle and weapons that fire energy blasts for distance shots. In his right hand, Ronon holds a stun rod, which are easy to come by on Kali. His left hand holds Teyla's arm in a grip he has no choice but to make uncomfortably strong. His teammate's face and hair are hidden behind a prisoner's hood, for she is recognizable among their group. She trembles.

"Teyla," he warns.

"I am playing," she replies from behind the hood. "Any arriving prisoner would be frightened."

"You aren't playing."

Ronon didn't want her along for this any more than he wanted McKay. They are willing but also dangerously unstable. He knows this because Teyla's been alternating between stony silence and fits of fury ever since he brought her to the Institute. She promised to remain in control for Sheppard's rescue, but Ronon doubts she can pull it off. McKay, equally disturbed in his own way, carries Dinstard Pistoule's book with him everywhere, as if it were holy and protective. He brought it with him today, in fact.

When he was a runner, Ronon feared for his own life. Today he thinks of Sheppard, of the other people he cares about, and his own survival seems inconsequential in comparison.

Nevillus walks beside him. He has been at Ronon's side before, when they came to find McKay, Teyla and Pistoule. As they were those other times, Nevillus's eyes are sharply focused on every detail around them. This is different from the silky looks he gives Ronon and reveals surprising strength. Strong or no, Nevillus is nervous. His facial muscles twitch ever so slightly.

"Do you remember the way?" he whispers, touching Ronon's arm as if it were a talisman.

"Yeah."

Munn pulls Nevillus sharply by the arm. He is supposed to be a prisoner arriving for his sentence, not a friend of anyone in the group.

The flight tarmac is very broad. It takes several minutes to reach the thick metal door of the high-security entrance, where prisoners are brought when they first arrive. Because transports have their own security personnel, only two disciplinarians guard this door. Ronon and Lomis overtake and kill them quickly and quietly by holding stun rods at full power against the backs of their skulls.

"It is not a bad way to die," says Lomis to Ronon, as if the Satedan cares. "The pain lasts for but a few seconds, then…" He makes brief flashing motions with his hands, like tiny fireworks.

"I would like to torture them instead," says Munn. "Like they tortured our beloved Pistoule."

"Shhh!" Nevillus admonishes. "Use all caution! This is not like the times before. I feel it."

Ronon feels it, too. He ran for seven years. Throughout those dark days, something like a voice in his head was always informing him about his environment. The voice screams at him now, but only he can hear it.

Since the entrance guards are dead, Teyla's hood is removed, her hands untied, so that she can participate. Arriving prisoners are given a brief medical examination. The entrance hallway leads directly to the facility, down one dim corridor, then two more.

A lone nurse works the clinic at this late hour. She sits reading a magazine while seven patients languish under her care. When Ronon enters, she doesn't look up. In a moment, she is stunned and dragged to an empty bed at the far end of the room.

Glancing from cot to cot, Ronon can't tell which patient might be Sheppard. Most lie curled up, heads buried in their hands, shaking from whatever is making them ill. Ronon thinks of what Nevillus said about allowing people to linger and die.

When Ronon finally casts eyes upon Sheppard, he feels as sick as when he saw McKay here. There is almost nothing left to the man. He is deeply unconscious and, incredibly, a tube runs from an IV stand, depositing a milky substance directly into his belly.

"Do not remove it!" Nevillus warns. "We'll take the entire unit with us and sort it out later."

So Ronon hands his blast weapon to Teyla, and does what he did before with McKay—gently wraps the man in a sheet and carries him from the clinic out into the hallway. The Satedan's belly has healed up nicely; it doesn't protest as he holds Sheppard close, as he would a child, as the rescue team scurries back along the narrow passage. Were it not for the voice in his head, Ronon would think that they had succeeded.

Teyla walks beside the bundle in Ronon's arms. She calls John's name a few times, until her teammate shushes her.

"Not now," he says, relieved that this time she doesn't bristle at having to wait.

They make it halfway to the tarmac entrance when a tremendous explosion rocks the confined area. Lomis and Munn, struck by energy fire, fall dead. Chunks of blasted wall and pulverized stone blocks fly about, and Ronon turns away, using his body to shield Sheppard from this debris. He notices Teyla and Nevillus momentarily stunned, righting themselves and standing tall to meet their fates.

Time, luck and everything else have run out. It is a trap.

TBC…


	10. Part 1, Chapter 10

**Part 1, Chapter Ten**

The guards who were killed at the entrance yielded two blast weapons, one of which Teyla possesses. Nevillus carries the other. He shoulders it and fires as Teyla rises, recovering from the concussive explosion. He pushes her onwards, towards the doorway and the tarmac beyond. Still cradling Sheppard, Ronon almost barrels into his teammate, as Nevillus shoves him after her. Glancing behind him, Ronon sees in Nevillus's squared shoulders a determination he wasn't aware the needy Kalian possessed.

"I will cover for you!" Nevillus shouts, aiming with a steady hand and shooting into the darkened, crumbling hallway that reverberates with disciplinarians' approaching footsteps. Ronon hefts Sheppard onto his shoulder and makes a momentary grab at Nevillus before the Kalian forces him away, emphatically this time.

More blasts rock the hallway as Ronon follows Teyla along the seemingly endless corridor. These shots land high, gouging oblong holes in the ceiling, instead of taking out the group itself. Chunks of masonry rain down, along with destroyed light fixtures and other benign things. Ronon thinks that someone wants to capture them, to use them, deplete them like the Wraith do, until they are husks.

Sheppard is a weightless ghost in Ronon's arms, and, sad as that is, a heavier man would have been harder to carry. The tarmac entrance is steps away, and then Teyla has the doors swung open and they are out in the air, on the pavement, pounding towards the distant transport.

A volley of shots rings out almost immediately. Nevillus, still protecting Ronon's back, grunts but keeps running, turning, shooting, running again. He is a surprisingly swift and accurate shot, taking out four disciplinarians on the tarmac.

An armed contingent races toward the transport, blocking Ronon's path, threatening the ship itself. Teyla uses her weapon to dispatch several of them. Ronon hears her panting breaths and the sound of her boots slapping against the pavement. Sheppard bounces across his shoulders, limp and silent. The feeding tube has come out, so Ronon tosses it and the nutrient bag away, disgusted.

An unexpected volley from the transport clears the remaining disciplinarians from their path. Rodney stands at the opening side hatch, holding a weapon brought from the planet, something they couldn't bring to the entrance without giving themselves away. With their point clear for the moment, Teyla focuses on putting out the lights at the nearest guard tower, missing some shots but hitting enough of her intended targets to black out the landing zone.

Now, the only light comes from the transport ship and the dashboard and headlights of a four-wheeled vehicle, similar to a Satedan sweep, approaching from the far end of the landing zone. It is louder and flimsier than a sweep, and its headlights wobble under the strain of its gunned engine. In the front passenger seat sits a small, pale man who yells into a radio, and Ronon can't hear what the man is saying but knows that he is rabidly angry.

Nevillus reaches Ronon and continues on toward the transport but slows when a shot from one of the towers hits the ground inches from Teyla's feet, causing the little man with the radio to scream even louder. As the vehicle comes closer still, Ronon hears the buzzing reception emanating from the receivers strapped to dead disciplinarians who litter the pavement around him, "Fools, I want her alive! If you shoot her, I will kill you!"

Ronon realizes then who this man is. Continuing towards the ship, he prays that Teyla won't do it, but knows in his heart that she will. They have no time for retribution and yet, if he were not carrying Sheppard, he would do the same thing.

The vehicle tears towards the escaping team, eating up the distance between itself and the transport. As its engines engage, the ship's superheated backwash forces Ronon to stop. He can't make headway until the scorching wind ceases and, in that pause, he watches Teyla fall back, drop to one knee and take careful aim.

Engine noise muffles Teyla's first shots. They miss, anyway, sending red tracers over the sweep and arcing into the night.

"Teyla! Keep moving!" hollers Ronon, but Teyla ignores him. She maintains her crouch, doesn't appear to be rushed at all.

The pale little man speaks into the radio and waves his chubby fist, unaware that he will lose no matter what happens.

Two days ago, before the transport began its journey to the moon, Teyla took Ronon's hand and didn't let go and said, "You must not allow any of us to be captured…."

She holds her weapon, now, aims it with precise movements, so she doesn't miss again.

"If I am about to be taken and you are armed…"

The vehicle approaches. Two disciplinarians rise from the back seat, swaying as they hoist weapons of their own, aiming not at Teyla but at Ronon and the bundle that he carries.

"You kill me there…" she said. "Do not let them touch me.…"

Teyla moves too slowly, or else this is simply how Ronon sees things as time compresses.

"Do not let them touch any us.…"

She has one knee on the ground, the other up, steadying her forearm. The sweep's headlights scrape along the pavement, and then, once they are close enough, illuminate the still and deadly Teyla. Before the disciplinarians can fire upon Ronon, the pale man screams, "Kill her now!" for he finally sees her there, is suddenly aware of how dangerous she is.

A flash strikes one disciplinarian, then the other. They fall back dead, one of them spilling from the sweep, becoming tangled under the rubber wheels and lying bloodied and broken as he rolls to a stop. Ronon hears Rodney's deep, ragged coughing behind him. He turns to see the sickly man holding the energy weapon from Kali, seemingly shocked with himself that so far in this rescue the legendarily poor marksman has managed to shoot with some effect.

The sweep is almost upon Teyla, who has remained motionless and focused while the vehicle continues its reckless approach. Ronon knows that she is waiting for the perfect moment, waiting for the Warden to come close enough to make his punishment as personal as his crime.

In a flash of red and grey and pink, Teyla hits her mark precisely. The Warden jerks fiercely, still held in place by his safety harness. The woman he tried to defeat shoots again and a third time. Parts of the pale man scatter, and a spray of blood and bone, hair and tissue flies into the driver's face. The driver wipes a hand over his eyes and, stupidly, automatically, continues toward Teyla, who takes him out, as well. He pitches into the dashboard. With tires squealing on the pavement, the sweep races past Teyla and the transport itself.

"I have killed you!" she shouts at the Warden's tattered remains as the sweep passes. "_I _havekilled _you_!"

Someone fires at her, at Ronon and at his precious cargo. Two go wide, another singes Ronon's arm as he ducks out of the way.

"Damn!" Ronon curses himself for losing focus and pace while absorbed in watching Teyla exact her revenge. The transport's engine has normalized. It is safe to continue towards the ship.

Additional disciplinarians have raced out onto the landing zone in the interim. Nevillus hurries back to Teyla and pulls her after him. She laughs and stumbles but does not protest when he insists. More glowing weapons fire cuts through the night. There is a split second between sound and feeling, when Ronon begs to be so blessed that everything will miss them. Then he feels a punch in his side, followed by the sound of Nevillus grunting, again.

The side hatch of their transport hangs open wide. Flaring blasts pelt the old prison ship. It was made to withstand attacks like this, and so it does. There is McKay, stiff with protective gear, his helmet askew and the chinstrap waving around. He covers for his friends, shoots at everything and at nothing; he shoots up at the sky and at the disciplinarians running in from the distance. Rodney's freaking, tiring, and it shows, as his shots miss their targets and succeeding only in slowing them down.

"Hurryhurryhurry!" McKay chants in breathless terror as he shoots. He pauses and lowers his weapon when Ronon and the rest come nearer. "Ronon…Is that…Oh, my God!"

"Keep shooting!" Ronon yells, as he closes the distance between the frighteningly open tarmac and the relative safety of the transport.

"I _am_ shooting!" McKay replies, raising the gun again and taking the time to be exasperated as well as panic-stricken.

Teyla's victorious shouts can be heard over the escalating whine of the transport, as the pilot rams the engine into full-on power.

She says, "I killed you! I killed you!" and, in the crazed glare of the transport's strobing lights, she looks untamable to Ronon, like she did the night he took her from this place.

The vehicle carrying the Warden careens out of control and, now that its driver is dead, revs higher as his weight lies across the accelerator. The sweep pitches and tips but stays upright as it heads back towards the prison entrance, scattering disciplinarians attempting to pursue Ronon and the rest. Teyla seems satisfied with what she's accomplished and doesn't turn back to watch as the sweep rams the building and bursts into flames.

"McKay, take Sheppard!" Ronon yells, hauling the Colonel off his shoulder as he reaches the ship. He practically throws Sheppard to the physicist and climbs aboard, pulling up Teyla and then Nevillus after her. Grabbing up Teyla's weapon, he stands at the opening as the hatch slowly rises, killing anyone who approaches without pause.

The pilot waits only to be certain that the hatch is closed before taking the ship into a steep lift-off away from the prison and its horrors, as if speed and altitude could shake off the memories of what happened there.

The ship levels off, and Teyla removes the sheet covering John Sheppard. She sits on the transport floor, cradling John in her arms. Ronon doesn't know that she hasn't touched him five months. He knows only that he will never forget how small the man seems, even as he is held by someone smaller still.

McKay grabs the med kit with shaking hands as Ronon collapses beside John and Teyla.

"Put this..." McKay holds out a trauma dressing. The Satedan looks at it dumbly. McKay places it to Ronon's side. "Keep it there and don't let up." Puzzled, Ronon complies. He looks over at Teyla.

"We have you, John," she says, eyes closed, rocking him gently. "We didn't forget."

The med kit, the vibrating ship, the recent past and near future are forgotten for a moment, as the team takes in the heartbreaking sight of their friend, who was shown no mercy for so long. There on the floor of the transport, the four are reunited. Ronon is shot, he's bleeding, but for these few moments he feels only relief and the familiar energy generated when the four of them are close together.

Teyla snaps out of it first. She shakes her head, blinks and looks at McKay. "I'm sorry, Rodney. Where do you need me?"

Rodney rouses, as well. "How should I know? I'm not that kind of doctor. Anybody else hurt?" He gazes around the transport, his eyes landing on Nevillus and growing large.

Nevillus is backed up against the side of the unit, clutching his gut with blood-soaked sleeves. He pants in short little puffs, shaking, barely conscious. Ronon gets to him first and lays him down. His friend has taken a hit to the center of his body, one that has angled off, transected his abdomen and cut him partially in half. Another shot has plundered his chest, torn off a section of ribs, shredded intercostal arteries and exposed his right lung, pinkish-grey and still moving when he breathes.

It is just a moment later that Nevillus begins the struggling whine of agonal breathing, loud enough to be heard above the transport's engines. Blood pools beneath him, sliding around Ronon's knees as he kneels beside his good friend. So many people have died before the Runner's eyes, and yet still he hardly knows what to say. Especially this time.

"Nevillus…I am in your debt and will never forget you," he says, hoping to make this man's last moments meaningful.

"You know…how I love you," the Kalian answers.

Ronon nods.

Nevillus says, "Pistoule lives" and smiles. He moves his hand and Ronon takes it. Tears slide from Nevillus's unfocused eyes back into his hairline. He squeezes Ronon's fingers with what little strength he still possesses and says, "I hoped that…one day…we would love each other."

There are two words that Ronon feels should never have to be said to someone who is dying.

"I'm sorry."

And now that he has said them, now that Ronon Dex has lost any chance to say anything more to him, Nevillus dies.

Ronon owes everything to Nevillus, who was so unconditionally devoted to him he gave up his life to save a stranger, just to make Ronon happy. More feelings pile up, but he chooses to ignore them. Instead, he touches Nevillus's hand to his forehead and wordlessly offers up the Satedan prayer for the dead.

Rodney mutters something to Teyla, who reluctantly relinquishes her hold on Sheppard. She passes him on to McKay, who lays him down and uses a rolled up jacket to pillow his head.

Teyla waits for Ronon to finish his prayer, waits for him to release the small, pale hand he holds carefully as if it might break. She covers Nevillus with one of the papery thermal blankets from the med kit. Then she gently moves Ronon off of his knees and onto his backside so she can assess his injury.

"I'm fine," he says, pushing her away.

She looks at him with the direct, no-bullshit stare he's come to know so well.

"Lie back," she says with more steel in her voice than he's ever heard before. So he complies. Ronon looks over at Sheppard, who is so pale and still he could be mistaken for dead were it not for the rise and fall of his chest.

"How is he, McKay?" he asks, already answered by his teammate's haunted expression.

"I don't know," Rodney answers. "This isn't something I'm used to doing." He touches John tentatively, as if he were handling a delicate and priceless object.

Teyla removes the trauma pad and uses scissors from the med kit to cut away Ronon's shirt. He catches her staring worriedly at his side. Then, she replaces the trauma pad and looks away quickly. Turning to McKay, her voice shaking, she says, "How long until we are landed?"

McKay glances at the instrument panel. "Twelve, fifteen hours maybe. The engine on this thing has its own agenda."

Teyla tries to keep her face still. It's bad and Ronon knows it.

"I'm fine," he repeats. Then, "I'll _be_ fine."

His breathing matches Rodney's, now, all squeezing sounds. There isn't a whole lot of pain, yet, and he thinks that he may have more time to say goodbye than Nevillus did.

Teyla brings him water, but the can flies from his hand when the first blast rocks the small vessel.

"Oh, God, they're shooting at us!" McKay regains his balance, grabs the back of the pilot's chair and stares over the man's shoulder out the front portal. "You said this didn't happen last time! Why didn't you see them on close-range sensors?"

"It's an old ship," the pilot replies, tersely.

"Turn on the cloak!"

"Can't. Broken," which seems to explain everything, as the pilot struggles to maintain control of the aged vessel.

"You could have _told_ me!" and now McKay, wheezing again, throws off the helmet that Ronon made him wear, and slides beneath the instrument panel to attempt a repair.

Ronon wants to be hopeful. He wants to believe in the triumph of good over evil. Another shot pounds the hull, followed by the sound of bending metal and popping stress points.

"Structural failure!" McKay's pushing buttons, rerouting power, working frantically to keep the disintegrating vessel spaceworthy.

A close pair of blasts strike the battle-weary ship.

Ronon looks at Nevillus's body. The thin blanket has come off of him and the dead man's head rocks side to side, as if expressing everyone's thoughts: "No, no, no, no, no, no, no…"

A grinding sound and then a huge shudder come, as part of an engine flies off into space. The craft lists up ninety degrees to port and everyone is hurled to the side, medical supplies and gear spilling with them. Nevillus's body slides onto John, who is still unconscious and unaware that a dead man now lies in his lap.

McKay strikes his head the panel he's working to fix. The ship's sudden bank tosses him upwards, and he comes down, dazed and gasping with old lungs, his head bleeding, to land in the heap with everyone else.

John, Teyla, Rodney and Ronon are a team, again. The Kalians tried every way possible to tear them apart. Ronon fell from the sky. Teyla and Rodney and Sheppard were hidden away from him. He finally understands why Teyla was so angry, why Rodney sabotaged the transport to buy his passage on it. They were not meant to suffer this in pieces. Now that they are free, they will die free together. Ronon finds a tiny measure of comfort in this because they would have had it rough going on with just three of them or just two and, especially, Ronon wouldn't want to go on if only he survived. He's had enough of being by himself.

He pushes away Nevillus's body and pulls his team close, so that they will die as one. The transport spins in space, powered by a single uncontrollable engine. The artificial gravity goes, the front portal cracks and shatters and sends the pilot into the void. The atmosphere goes, followed by duffels and weapons and McKay's copy of _The Known World_. Then Ronon closes his eyes tightly and feels the sudden, painful vacuum of explosive decompression...

**End Part 1**

TBC

_**A/N:** Deepest thanks to those who have followed the story so far. Thanks also to those who left feedback. If you enjoyed this chapter, feel free to leave some feedback birdseed for the skypig._

_The chapters comprising Parts 2 and 3 will be posted on the same schedule as those of the first part, one every other day. With the alert bots down (still!) it is not easy to know when a new chapter has been posted, so depend on the every-other-day schedule._


	11. Part 2, Chapter 1

_**A/N:** A quieter chapter. Part 2 in its entirety might be thought of as a hiatus of sorts. To everyone who has left feedback, hopefully e-mail system will be working again soon so you'll receive my responses. Deepest thanks to everyone who has come with me this far. _

**The Known World**

**Part 2: "Hope"**

A morning tension mounts

The sun a demon riding

Across the vast unclouded sky

Away and into hiding

Only the darkness sees

The ways we love each other

The sun will not partake of this

It lives in darkness' cover.

Dinstade Pistoule, "What the Darkness Saw," _The Known World_, p. 326.

**Chapter One**

Teyla watches John's chest move, up, down, up, down. No one knows what to do for him. He may still be in there somewhere, but the penlites don't see anything, and the small round things stuck to his head don't show anything understandable, and John's not talking, either.

A doctor on the Daedalus makes sure that John's chest keeps rising and falling. He checks the wires and the feeding tube and the mask delivering oxygen. The nurses show compassion when they take his temperature and when they shave his beard and wash down his arms and legs as he sleeps.

"It's your turn," the doctor, Dr. Jacobs, tells Teyla.

Her arms are folded in front of her chest. She refuses to change into a paper gown. A nurse records her vital signs and asks her questions about her overall health. Teyla is not even trying to cooperate.

Disturbing sounds reach her. Ronon is having trouble breathing and is in considerable pain. McKay is still unconscious. From her vantage point sitting on this table in a small examination room, Teyla sees the three of them. They are battered and stunned and sick, and make wheezy, rasping sounds—except for John, who makes almost no sound at all. Her little problems, a bruise here and there, are nothing compared with how the other members of her team are faring, so she tells the doctor to see to them.

The doctor stands directly in front of her, his hands shoved into his pockets. This doctor is quite a bit older than Dr. Beckett. Not _old_-old, but more world-weary. He watches Teyla's face. She feels naked under his glare and holds her arms more tightly against herself.

"You're not going to let me examine you at all?" Jacobs says.

Teyla shakes her head. Since she regained consciousness, none of these prying strangers has been allowed to touch her. "I am fine, Doctor. When I am back in Atlantis, I will see Dr. Beckett if anything arises."

Without a word, Jacobs hands Teyla a release form, which she signs.

"If you keel over and die between now and the time we reach Atlantis, my ass is covered," he says, taking the signed form from her and walking away. Teyla watches as he inserts the release form into a medical record that he has started on "Emmagen, Teyla" and then removes his glasses to rub blood-shot eyes.

Ronon groans and slowly rolls from his back to his side. His bed is tilted up to ease his breathing, but he still feels uncomfortable. Teyla leaves the oppressive little exam room and comes to stand where Ronon can see her. She takes his hand, the one that doesn't have an IV stuck into the back of it, and holds it tight and tells him to squeeze as hard as he wants to, if that's what he needs. Either he's holding back or hasn't much strength in him, yet, because his fingers barely move.

"You are looking better, Ronon, even though you probably do not believe me. You were much worse when we came here."

He nods under the mask. The doctor said he suffered an injury to his ribs and a bruised lung from the blast that struck his flank as he carried John Sheppard across the tarmac battlefield on the Kali's moon. The skin is burned there, as well. When he moves around, Teyla smells the topical cream used to cover the wound.

Jacobs ordered low-dose morphine, enough to tide him along, but not enough to keep him completely pain free.

"Respiratory depression," said the doctor, as if Teyla understood.

McKay sustained a concussion when the ship pitched up and sent him flying. Teyla doesn't remember much about all of that. She vaguely recalls the jolt of explosives hitting the ship, the sound of the hull tearing and violent forces propelling her into the freezing, airless void of space. The Daedalus's transporter beam scooped them up and deposited them inside its welcoming belly at the moment Teyla lost consciousness. She doesn't remember anything after that until she awoke in this infirmary.

A nurse checks McKay's IV line. She takes his temperature and pries open his eyelids to assess his pupils. He suddenly reaches up and grabs her wrist, which makes the nurse jump back. But it's just a reaction; he's not really awake, yet. Taking up her penlite and paperwork, the nurse quickly steps away.

Teyla is amused; the nurse doesn't know Rodney as well as she does, doesn't know that Rodney can be like this even when he's merely sleeping. He is close to waking up, so she moves to his bedside and says his name quietly.

When McKay opens his eyes, they scoot around their sockets looking for focus. They finally rest on her. He pulls up the side of his mouth a bit to let her know he's in there after all.

"You are alive," she says, because that is what she wishes someone had said to her when she awoke. "We are all alive."

Her friend closes his eyes. Teyla puts her hand on his chest, feels it rise and fall. She looks over at John, who is still breathing, as well, seemingly to the exclusion of all else.

The doctor says that John's mind is gone, but Teyla doesn't believe that. It is merely hiding from the terrible things that happened in the moon prison, she thinks. Or it has been stolen and can be reacquired if the proper type of currency is offered.

"Hope...to repair the body…" mumbles McKay. He is quoting Dinstard Pistoule, again. Poetry sounds odd coming from the irascible physicist. 'Hope to repair the body, love to repair the mind.' Teyla understands why McKay would like this poem. Just like him to commit to memory verse about fixing things.

OoOoO

The Daedalus sends a message to Atlantis. It reads, "All SGA-1 team members accounted for. Medical reports to follow by databurst." Caldwell obviously doesn't want to broadcast what's happened, what's going on. That is why a second after Elizabeth's mood lifts for the first time in five months, it plummets again. The burst is routed to Beckett's node. Elizabeth decides not to wait. She walks to the infirmary immediately.

"Major Lorne, Dr. Zelenka, the Daedalus has reported in," she tells them. "Meet me in Carson's office."

She is terse, focused, and more afraid than she's been in a long, long time. They are "accounted for."

Beckett sits at his desk, chin in hand, staring at his laptop. His eyes don't leave the screen as Elizabeth enters, followed by her senior staff. The doctor sits perfectly still except to push the right-arrow key, skipping to the next page.

If her hands weren't folded up together and held firmly against herself, Elizabeth thinks that everyone would know that she is breaking apart. No matter what Beckett has to say about the team, she is splintering and will not be back together for a long time.

Finally, he looks up. "Close the door," he says, and, even though it is within her reach, Elizabeth can't move at all to shut it. "Sit down." It takes a few moments for Elizabeth to realize that he is speaking to her.

Carson backs up the file, hitting the left-arrow key this time. He describes Ronon's fall from the jumper and what that did to him. He talks about the Satedan's flail chest and about McKay's lung problems and concussion. He says that Teyla doesn't want to be examined.

"But Ronon and Rodney are out of the woods?" Elizabeth asks.

"I don't know," Carson responds. "Dr. Jacobs is guardedly optimistic." He sighs and then sits up, taking a moment to refocus.

"Colonel Sheppard…" he taps the right-arrow key again, and Elizabeth is going to pass out if he doesn't get on with it. "Teyla reports that he was subjected to a machine. Says she saw the effects of this machine on another man, who is now brain damaged."

He pauses, struggling to finish. Elizabeth wishes that she possessed the strength to help him, but she's so horrified she barely knows what to tell herself, let alone someone else.

Carson continues, "He is unconscious. His higher-level brain activity fluctuates strangely, going from flat to sleep patterns and back to flat. His EEG shows this one minute…" and Carson turns the laptop towards Elizabeth. The screen shows a graph with stacked lines that run more or less straight across the screen. "And this the next…" and he pushes the right arrow key and the stacked lines form the peaks and valleys of normal, relaxed brain activity.

"And Colonel Sheppard will not wake up?" asks Radek, who stands directly behind Elizabeth, his hands on the top of her chair. She feels his knuckles rubbing against the back of her neck.

"He's essentially comatose," Carson answers. He points at the screen, but then lets his hand fall because there is nothing to see, really. "Dr. Jacobs can't explain this. Franklyh, until I've examined him, neither can I. One minute Colonel Sheppard is brain dead and the next he's not."

"This was deliberate?" Lorne hasn't said anything until now. He looks like he's still trying to figure out who's responsible, so that he can go and shoot them.

Carson closes his laptop. Elizabeth wishes it were just that easy to put away bad news. She twists her hands together as more details come forth. Beckett holds back nothing as he describes injuries, illness and abuse, using words like "experimentation" and "multi-system trauma" and saying, "God only knows their psychological condition." He has to stop several times to bring his emotions under control.

_John Sheppard sends his last transmission: "The Kalians are acting weird…"_ And Elizabeth drops her head into her hands because if it is this hard on Carson telling it and this hard on the rest of them hearing it, what must it have been like to live through it?

"Elizabeth?" Radek touches her shoulder.

She looks up at him, at Carson and Lorne.

"I'm sorry," she mutters, regaining control. "Anything else?" she asks, thinking, _"What have I done? What have I done? What have I done?"_

Carson shakes his head tiredly, even though his patients haven't arrived yet. Elizabeth rises and leaves without a goodbye or a nod of departure. She doesn't cry or fidget or speak to anyone. Atlantis is the size of New York City. A mile from Carson's tiny office she's still walking, still thinking it, her new mantra, letting it roll around in her mind: What have I done, what have I done, what have I done…

OoOoO

It is the night before the Daedalus's return, three days since Caldwell's brief message and the distressing databurst that accompanied it. Elizabeth reads Caldwell's supplemental report, which describes how his crew followed the roaming transmitter beacon by jumper and then on foot, until the two-person Kalian diversionary team was finally found.

Caldwell isn't the best writer in the galaxy.

"We interrogated the Kalian diversionary team," he writes. "We were told that the puddle jumper's beacon was being moved throughout the galaxy to prevent us from focusing on the Kali and its moon, where Col. Sheppard and his team were being held. We were proximal to the moon when sensors picked up within a disintegrating vessel three personal locator signals identified as belonging to members of the missing Atlantis team. We locked onto the locator signals. We used beam transport to acquire said Atlantis team. We provided immediate medical care to said Atlantis team..."

Despite Caldwell's lack of literary prowess, Elizabeth feels that he and his "we" deserve commendations and steak dinners.

It is impossible to sleep tonight, so Elizabeth stops trying, just as Beckett suggested. She takes a shower, styles her hair and puts on a little makeup. She tidies her quarters, moves the little work table closer to the wall.

"Okay, that's two hours killed right there," she says. She's really gone to town with herself in order to eat up more time, has put on body lotion all over and filed her nails.

Few people are awake, so she walks the halls and thinks. If she hadn't taken a shower already, she'd go to the gym and work out for an hour or two. Radek's not in the lab when Elizabeth visits there. She pauses, looking at the whiteboard and at the laptops with their screensavers bouncing around, then leaves.

No one occupies the cafeteria, right now, which is fine for Elizabeth. She makes coffee in the large urn and helps herself to some fruit from the kitchen.

After a while, a couple of people show up, early birds attracted by the smell of coffee and the chance to visit for a few minutes. Beckett is one of these early risers. He sits down across from Elizabeth.

"Are you doing better?" he asks.

She nods, holding her hands very tightly around her coffee mug.

"A little. Six hours a couple of nights ago. Nothing last night, though."

They talk in code because they are not alone.

"Understandable. I didn't do very well myself."

"You've informed Dr. Jacobs of my situation?"

Beckett looks away, watches someone else enter the cafeteria and head straight for the coffee.

"Yes, I have."

They don't say anything for a while. If the tables were turned she would have done the same thing herself. She was taken off the meds weeks ago but still has trouble sleeping almost every night. Beckett's just looking out for her, in case she approaches Jacobs in a moment of weakness.

"Maybe once they're back I won't have so much trouble."

"I'm thinking the same. Why don't we see how it goes, then?"

Elizabeth nods. She'll give it a little more time. After that she will either go crazy or become too exhausted to do her job, which is practically the same thing.

A click in her headset, in Carson's. Caldwell is hailing them, giving an ETA of just twenty minutes.

Elizabeth acknowledges the transmission. "Do you mind if I follow you back?" she asks Carson, as they rise together. "I'd like to be there when they arrive."

He nods and then pulls on her jacket sleeve, just a little tug. "You know that I'm on your side."

"I do. Thank you, Carson. I mean it."

The team will be beamed directly to the infirmary. In anticipation of that, one of the nurses has put up streamers in a couple of places and stuck to the walls some balloons with "Welcome Home!" written across them with a black Sharpie.

Elizabeth feels stronger now that she has something to look forward to. Month after month, she willed Sheppard's team to return. In a few minutes, John and Ronon and Teyla and Rodney will rematerialize right in front of her, just as she's wished and imagined and prayed for almost half a year.

In a few minutes, she will see what she has done.

TBC…


	12. Part 2, Chapter 2

_**A/N:** Once again, I'd like to thank my betas, Inkling, Aslowhite and Pranksta, for their great work, support and friendship. My hat is off to you all._

**Part 2, Chapter Two**

A tableau. A vignette. A split-second still-life illuminated by white light, there, in the middle of the infirmary. Three patients, one stubborn Athosian woman, Caldwell, Novak, Jacobs and a nurse rematerialize. Beckett sees them in that still flash; he will never forget it.

Teyla stands behind Rodney, who is seated in a wheelchair. Her hands grasp his shoulders, keeping him upright. He holds a basin in his lap. Ronon is also in a chair, with a nurse behind him. Colonel Sheppard lies on a flexible stretcher on the floor. Jacobs crouches at one end and Caldwell crouches at the other. Novak stands among the crowd with a datapad in one hand, batches of disks containing medical records and radiological films in the other.

"Great, Hermiod," she speaks into her headset, after looking around to ensure the transport was successful. "Fingers and toeses and tails and noses are all present."

There is a short silence from the Asgard, then, "Indeed."

The activity begins when McKay throws up into the basin and the Colonel is lifted onto a bed. Ronon is still in terrible shape; it takes four people to help him get settled.

For the next 15 hours Beckett runs tests, treats wounds and constantly re-assesses his seriously ill patients. He discusses things with Dr. Jacobs, walks over to John or to whoever is the center of his attention at the moment, does a check or a probe or a test, gives orders, and then he goes back over his notes.

Teyla is there the whole time, moving from John to Rodney to Ronon, touching them and whispering encouraging words. She still refuses to be examined beyond having her vital signs taken. Carson calls in Heightmeyer, whom Teyla rebuffs. She does it nicely but firmly. Carson adds notes about this to Teyla's file. When he has the time, he will speak with her.

Elizabeth is allowed to witness the return of her people, permitted access to them until Beckett becomes impatient with her unanswerable questions. Sensing his mood, she excuses herself, much to his relief. People hang out by the infirmary entrance, watching and waiting. No one is allowed in unless there is some special reason for it. Not Radek Zelenka, not Major Lorne, no one. Carson gives them hapless looks and then sends them all away.

Ronon is switched to high-flow oxygen and given a drug cocktail to help him sleep and heal. McKay gets Compazine, which calms his nausea.

In the area farthest from the infirmary entrance, John lies as a silent testament to a worst-case scenario. His bruises will fade. If his distal pinky joint were the only thing missing from him, he would be considered the luckiest man in the galaxy.

It's been fifteen hours. Beckett drinks tea in his office, re-reading test results. He's taken off his shoes and propped up his feet on a chair. He wiggles his toes from time to time, giving his poor dogs a break. A movement to his right and there's Elizabeth standing at the infirmary door, raising her eyebrows at him questioningly. He waves her in. She sees his feet and smiles as Carson quickly takes them down, brushes off the chair and scoots it over towards her.

"Tell me," she says, sitting.

"Ronon's going to be okay."

"Well, that's good news."

"It will take time, but he'll heal and be his old self."

Elizabeth nods and so he continues. "Rodney is having breathing difficulty from long-term exposure to an alien spore that almost took his life. I've given him anti-fungal medication, steroids, but it's too early to tell whether or not he's improving. He has a mild concussion, as well. Frankly, I'm surprised he's not more out of it."

"Jokes about hard heads… Spare me, Carson."

"Yes, well…" He sighs and shifts in his seat. "As before, the Colonel's EEGs range from brain dead to napping. He is occasionally minimally responsive to his environment, but nothing beyond that. I've done a CAT scan, an MRI, blood chemistry, everything."

"He's not brain dead."

Part of Carson thinks, yes, that's it exactly; part of him knows that's not the case.

"It's not that simple," he tells her. This is almost too esoteric even for him to understand. Medical school didn't include classes on alien technology. "Sometimes he is. And sometimes he's not. There is higher brain function, but something's preventing transmission of those impulses. He could be all there, Elizabeth, all in there just like you and me, but just not capable of typical movement, thought, speech or anything else."

"He's awake?" She turns in her seat and looks at the Colonel lying across the way.

"Maybe. Maybe not."

"But he can be treated?"

"I don't know. It's been only a short time."

Elizabeth stares at Sheppard until Carson calls her name. She asks, "How is Teyla?" obviously trying to redirect his attention.

"Well…" he begins with a sigh. They look out into the infirmary proper. Teyla stands beside Ronon's bed, quietly conversing with him. Ronon looks like he's crying and Teyla puts her hand on his chest, where his ribs are broken and gently holds it there while he wipes his hand over his face. Beckett rises and walks over to him. Elizabeth follows.

"Are you in any pain?" he asks Ronon. Two pairs of dark eyes look up at him. Carson thinks that he may have said something stupid or ironic, but sticks with practical matters. "Should I give you a wee bit more pain medicine, then?"

Ronon shakes his head. The Satedan seems half-naked without his dreadlocks. He looks like a Marine, with his clean-shaven face and the soft, dark fuzz just beginning to cover his scalp. Beckett looks over at McKay, whose equally bare head peeks out from under the blanket that covers him.

Carson returns to his office, allowing Elizabeth time to visit with Ronon and Teyla. She speaks with them for a short time, until Ronon falls off to sleep, then comes to stand before Rodney, who hasn't stirred in hours. She is careful not to wake him, since he is still pale and thin and his breaths rumble in his chest. He will need to be watched closely.

Last, Elizabeth approaches Sheppard. They are close friends who have shared many incredible experiences. Carson knows that she would give up everything she values in a heartbeat to see him whole again. So would anyone on his team, anyone in Atlantis. Beckett watches from his office as she takes Sheppard's hand, leans down close and murmurs something secret to him.

Beckett looks away from this painful reunion. It is one of many that he will witness over the next several days.

Elizabeth returns to Carson's office, scrubbing tears off her cheeks.

"That's alright, then," he says, handing her a tissue.

Surprisingly, Elizabeth asks him nothing more about John's condition, as if she got all of the information she needs through his skin.

"I want you to talk to Teyla," he says.

"Why?"

He turns to look over at Teyla again, since her back is to him and neither she nor Ronon can see him stare. "She says she is in perfect health, refuses a checkup."

Elizabeth crosses her arms. "You're the CMO."

"Aye, I could order her, but I think it best if you chat up with her first."

A long conversation right now is not what Carson needs. Elizabeth looks like she's going to start with more questions, and he rubs his face to blot them all out.

"Tomorrow is fine," he says, benevolently cutting her off before she begins.

To his surprise. Elizabeth nods and leaves.

OoOoO

Teyla's room looks exactly the same as it did the day she left. So much time has passed, so much has happened, she wonders how at least some of these changes haven't spontaneously altered her quarters.

She has brought her supper in here to eat. Beckett has banned her from the infirmary for a day, unless some physical problem arises. He has asked her to take it easy and to eat and sleep and exercise as she sees fit. In short, he has placed a certain amount of trust in her, and she intends to abide by it.

There is a bowl of good soup on her tray, plus some bread. Also an apple and tea. She could have eaten cakes and sweet things but wants to wait until someone else is up and about so she can share these treats with them.

After eating her meal, Teyla lies on her bed, staring at the familiar surroundings. If Beckett hadn't booted her out of the infirmary, she would be there now, because taking comfort feels wrong when her teammates are sick and injured.

Elizabeth comes to her door, asking to be let inside. Teyla has been expecting a visit from someone—Beckett or Heightmeyer or, yes, Elizabeth herself.

_She hears McKay wheezing on the other side of the wall, feels Sheppard's energy coming through the shield separating them in the visiting place. She wraps a sheet around herself and rushes from the prison. The Warden's chilly, pale hand touches her body and Nevillus strokes Ronon's face._

Teyla knows too much. Having this information is dangerous.

Elizabeth comes to sit on one of Teyla's thick, soft rugs. The Athosian does the same. Two skilled negotiators face each other. Even if Teyla hasn't brokered the same sorts of deals, she isn't ignorant of Elizabeth's technique.

Still, Teyla is a little bit shocked to be hit with "Tell me everything."

Elizabeth isn't being at all timid, trying to coax out the truth; she is grabbing it with a pliers and pulling.

Teyla talks about the Kalians and their fascist regime, the oppression of everyone not among the small, pale, ruling class. Speaking becomes more difficult when she describes watching Ronon fall from the jumper and how she, John and Rodney were captured and incarcerated in the moon prison. Her voice and hands shake when Teyla repeats what she's already told Dr. Beckett about the machine and John's reaction to his sessions with it.

She doesn't mention the Warden or Nevillus or speak of the time when John admitted that he was losing hope.

They discuss Pistoule, whom McKay keeps mentioning, even though he's still only half awake. Because Pistoule is not someone close to her, Teyla is so relaxed discussing him that she doesn't see the question coming.

"Why won't you let Carson examine you?"

She is caught out and just about kicks herself for it.

"There is no reason," she replies, picking at the rug on which she sits. "I am fine and do not need medical attention."

She looks up…

Elizabeth knows. It's in her eyes as they become a little wider, as her brows rise up the slightest bit. She opens her mouth as if to utter something soft and understanding. This is exactly what Teyla wants to avoid.

"I am very tired, now, Dr. Weir. Would you mind if we ended this discussion?"

She rises and opens her door. An empty, darkened hallway lies beyond.

"Teyla…"

"I am fine. But tired. Dr. Beckett has ordered me to rest, so…"

For a second, she thinks that Elizabeth is going to demand it out of her. Athosian fighting sticks lean up against the wall and, although no doubt out of shape, Teyla thinks that she could easily chase out someone as unskilled in combat as Dr. Weir.

To her vast relief, Elizabeth gets to her feet and walks to the door.

"We will have to talk again," she says, sounding conciliatory rather than threatening.

Teyla says, "I am willing to contribute whatever useful information I can."

Again, Elizabeth looks as if she wants to say something comforting, but then stops herself. "I'm so happy that you are home," she says instead.

This isn't a time for tears, but Teyla feels like crying anyway. She can't help herself and embraces Elizabeth, who looks careworn and exhausted. They part having reached neither agreement nor stalemate.

Dust has settled on the fighting sticks in her absence. It flies around has Teyla quickly takes up and swings the weapons, listening to the familiar whoosh as they cut through the air. Sparring is done barefooted, so off come her shoes and socks. The rugs underfoot give her no traction. She kicks them aside but, no, it's still not right.

A short time later, Teyla is in the gym, battling an unseen opponent, remembering John Sheppard's grace and speed and all of the times she fought with him here. And all of the times she fought for him elsewhere.

TBC…


	13. Part 2, Chapter 3

_**A/N:** Thanks, once again, to my betas, Inkling, Aslowhite and Pranksta!_

**Part, 2, Chapter Three**

The nurse lays a damp cloth on McKay's forehead. This is both annoying and motherly—which makes it even more annoying. He threw up, again. And, now, even though he's not saying anything about it, he's having more trouble catching his breath.

The wetted cloth is very cold, which matches the nagging feeling in the pit of his stomach. Beckett gives him pills and injects various substances into his IV line. People come by with food, which sits on the tray uneaten. The nagging feeling is his powerful brain explaining the obvious: Safe is safe. Sound is another thing entirely.

He takes several slow, deep breaths, which only serve to remind him that his lungs are still broken.

Sheppard sighs lightly behind the curtain that separates his bed from the rest of the room. McKay has spent a lot of hours staring at the curtain. It is grey and plain.

"I want to visit the Colonel," he says. The nurse helps him up and moves the curtain aside. A chair has been placed next to John's bed, so McKay sits himself down.

"Is there any change?" he asks, as he does every day. The nurse shakes her head.

The Colonel, rail thin and still bearing bruises in places, lies in the relaxed posture of someone deeply under, unreachably gone. He is missing the tip of his right pinky and bears scars on his wrists. Mostly, John is just this body, now. He sighs from time to time, jerks a limb on occasion. Other than that, he does nothing but breathe in and out, in and out.

When McKay puts his hand on John's arm and feels the bones there, he asks, "What purpose did this serve?"

When he looks very closely, McKay sees Sheppard's eyes moving around under their lids. Then they stop. Then they begin moving again and, all the while, the EEG screen shows the peculiar sleeping-dead-sleeping-dead brain activity of which Beckett spoke.

Ronon is awake. He and Rodney regard each other. Neither questions nor answers pass between them.

Seeing that Rodney is tiring, the nurse helps him back to bed. John is alone, again, so she pulls the curtain shut around him.

Ronon watches McKay from the next bed over.

"You aren't sleeping as much as you should," he says.

McKay replies, "Pistoule wrote, 'As long as one man lives under tyranny, my bed will be as stone.'"

"I agree." Radek Zelenka approaches. McKay hasn't seen him since before leaving for Kali. The Czech looks as changed from his normal self as Sheppard does, but in completely opposite ways.

"Radek," Rodney says, surprised at how happy he is to see him. He moves to shake his colleague's hand and is astonished when he gets hauled in for an unexpected hug. Radek's arms feel incredibly strong. Disturbed, McKay pulls away.

"What happened to you?"

"Pardon?"

Rodney pats his own bicep. "All of this."

"An order from Elizabeth. I can shoot, now, too."

Rodney knows that Radek could gloat, but that he is by nature a modest man. McKay has taken advantage of this personality trait many a time. He doesn't like it that Radek looks so different, though. It's complicated, and complications make Rodney feel like throwing up, again.

"How is Colonel Sheppard?" Radek motions towards the curtain.

McKay shakes his head. "Still unconscious. Or whatever. It changes." He sighs and clears his throat. Zelenka pours him some water from a pitcher at bedside. This small act of kindness touches him.

"I thought that Ronon was dead," McKay says, trying to be kind to someone in return. He speaks softly, determined to tell the story without suffocating in the process. "He fell five hundred feet out of a moving jumper. Can you imagine that? He was dead but he came and got me. Then he went back and got Teyla." He grins unabashedly at Ronon, who smiles back uncertainly.

"Yes," Radek says. "I heard about that."

"I wasn't really dead," Ronon clarifies.

"Well, of course you weren't dead," McKay says, annoyed that Ronon is arguing this minutia with him. "Haven't you ever heard of a paradox? You were dead enough."

"And you, Ronon and Teyla rescued Colonel Sheppard," Radek says, in a way that is surely meant to be encouraging but instead throws a bucket of cold water on McKay's mood.

"No, we didn't," he snaps, unable to help himself. "He's not rescued at all."

The grey curtain around the Colonel's bed moves a little when a nurse walks by. No sound comes from behind it.

Zelenka sits very straight and folds his arms across his chest. "Dr. Beckett will find a way to help him."

Rodney responds with a scowl that almost covers his despair.

"It is not like you, Rodney, to give up so quickly."

McKay almost wilts under Zelenka's determined stare.

Radek continues, "Ronon rose from the dead to save you, so how can you embrace defeat now?"

"That was different."

Zelenka looks almost angry, as if he's listened to enough dreary predictions to last a lifetime.

"Ronon fell to his death but he did not die. You are here, all of you, pulled alive from space. Do not waste my time with faithless prattle!" Radek stops, looking surprised at having raised his voice. He says, more quietly, "I did not believe for a moment that you would not return."

Rodney remembers when the doctor in the moon prison pronounced him dying and then walked away. He wanted to see Teyla and Sheppard to tell them to keep going and never give up. That is what Sheppard burned into him every time they stood in death's doorway. That is what Sheppard would expect from him now.

Recalling that terrible day ties a knot in McKay's chest. He raises his chin and says, "It pains me to say it, but you're right."

"I wasn't trying to…"

"Pistoule wrote, 'By healing others we heal ourselves.'"

Zelenka cocks his head curiously.

"Don't ask," Ronon says. "Unless you want to be here all day listening to McKay recite poetry."

"It's prose," McKay corrects.

"Who is Pis…"

"You'd better get out while you have the chance, Doc."

With a suspicious glance at Rodney, Zelenka rises to leave. McKay holds his tongue and willingly submits to another hug, which this time includes an unexpected back slap. Then Radek holds him at arm's length and looks him straight in the eye.

"We will work together, Rodney. It will be okay."

And McKay believes him.

OoOoO

"Good afternoon, Ronon, Rodney," Teyla says, as she pulls aside the curtain around John's bed, leans over and kisses his forehead.

"Hello, John." She keeps her voice gentle, like a breeze.

The EEG shows that John is brain dead, right now. Ronon and Rodney listen as Teyla describes the day for John's benefit. The weather is sunny and warm. Pancakes were served at breakfast. Teyla says that she is waiting for Ronon to recover so that she can spar with them.

"Perhaps Rodney will decide to train, as well," she says, hoping that John hears the smile in her voice.

"Me? That is so totally unlikely. I…" McKay stops when he realizes that Teyla's joking. "Oh, ha, ha. Does everyone in this galaxy have such a dry sense of humor?"

"Would anyone care for a push?"

They look at her blankly.

"In the chair, I mean. I thought that I would take one of you outside for some air."

She looks directly at Ronon, who slowly rises and seats himself in the wheelchair as Teyla rolls it close and holds it for him. In a short time, they are outside, on an empty balcony a few minutes' stroll from the infirmary. The ocean is calm this day.

Teyla and Ronon are far away from Kali, from the ruined jumper with a gaping hole in it, and from the moon prison and from where their transport was blown up in space. They are far from the few Kalians who cared about them and from the many who tried to destroy them.

"I'm still there," says Ronon, gazing out over the ocean and seeing nothing of Atlantis at all.

"So am I," Teyla replies. "I fear I will never be able to leave it."

She sits next to the chair and lets Ronon stroke her hair. Since his dreadlocks were taken away from him, he enjoys the feel of Teyla's hair in their place.

"That mind doctor says I should talk about my feelings," Ronon says. "I'm not gonna."

"Dr. Heightmeyer says it will make us feel better to do so."

He shakes his head. "Nope." But his nose is getting red, and Teyla sees that his eyes are shining.

"We did what was necessary, Ronon."

"Nevillus was a good man, a good friend. I toyed with his feelings. Now he's dead."

Teyla pulls Ronon's hand from her hair and clasps it tightly. _She sees John on his knees with a gun pointed at his head and McKay shivering out in the Play Yard._

"'No love exists without sacrifice,'" she says.

Her teammate blinks as if coming out of a dream and looks at her.

"It is something Rodney once quoted from Pistoule."

Ronon nods, understanding. He says "Sacrifice," as if it were both holy and profane.

They watch the ocean for a while longer. Teyla then wheels Ronon to the cafeteria. There she finds two cupcakes and some juice, which she brings over to a table that they are sharing. She gives one of the cakes and a cup of juice to Ronon.

"I'm not hungry," he says.

"Please. I have been looking forward to this."

She begins to eat and sees him staring at the cake in his hand. "What is wrong?"

Ronon shakes his head stubbornly.

"Would Nevillus not want you to enjoy this?"

It takes him a while to think this through. Teyla has never seen Ronon so contemplative. Finally, he eats the cake in two bites without savoring it, and washes it down with the juice.

"Probably would," he says.

OoOoO

Carson's taken x-rays and performed pulmonary function tests on McKay. He's even done a lung biopsy. The news is a little better than awful.

"Your lungs are a mess," he says.

"That's a medical term? 'A mess'?"

Beckett looks at McKay with enough sympathy to scare the crap out of him.

"A great number of the spores are still in your lungs, severely affecting your alveoli and bronchi. Looks like you've developed a progressive condition similar to emphysema. I can prescribe steroids and albuterol, which might help."

"I was better on Kali. Their treatment was working!" He can't keep from whining. After all, how could a socially backwards place like Kali have better medical care than bright, shining Atlantis?

"Perhaps you weren't completely cured or stopped it too soon. Do you remember the name of the medication that they gave you?

"How should I know? It was something that smelled bad and dissolved in my mouth."

Carson writes this information in Rodney's chart. Then he sets down the papers and sighs heavily.

"You will need to use a portable oxygen unit once you're discharged…"

McKay puts up his hand and closes his eyes to all of this. "You're telling me I need a little tank to wheel around with me?"

"Rodney…"

"Is that it?"

When Carson doesn't respond, McKay turns in his bed and pulls the blanket over his head. In short order, he feels himself suffocating, so he removes the blanket and sits up, gasping.

"Here," Carson says, placing the mask over his nose and mouth.

Rodney nods but not in acquiescence. It's a mere 'thank you' nod and nothing more.

A week later, McKay walks to his lab for the first time since returning to Atlantis. He takes careful steps and stops whenever he feels winded.

McKay has been extremely conscientious about taking his meds and using the O2 tank, but he is still sick and, if he's perfectly honest with himself, he knows that he is not getting better. Sometimes he hears the prison doctor,_ "I am tracking your decline,"_ and shivers and feels his stomach drop just as it did that terrible day. Sometimes he feels a little better and hope fills him like a good meal. Day by day, though, he is worse, so he takes extra puffs on his inhaler and turns up the tank as far as it will go.

Sheppard lies in the infirmary somewhere between alive and dead. A machine did this to him. McKay has made a silent promise to honor John's unshakable determination, a promise that he intends to keep.

Covering the seemingly insurmountable distance from his quarters to the lab takes McKay a very long time. He finally gets there and tries to appear typically energetic and alert. After a few minutes of catch-up with Radek, McKay opens his laptop and then has his first dizzy spell of the day. He grips the side of his work table and takes a long, slow breath.

The day goes on like this: work, dizzy, work, tired, work, can't breathe, work, dizzy, work, dizzy and tired, work, dizzy, work, can't breathe, work, can't breathe.

In the afternoon, McKay excuses himself to the cafeteria. His appetite is nothing compared to how it used to be and Carson's told him to take in high-calorie foods for a while. They don't agree with him, so he eats some Jell-o and half of a bowl of rice. On his way back to the lab, McKay stops in the hallway, needing to rest. He pretends to study the datapad he has with him while he tries to regain some strength.

"Rodney?" Zelenka approaches, wearing shorts and a long-sleeved t-shirt damp with sweat.

"Oh. Radek. Someone chasing you?" he asks, covering.

"Today is a light day. I ran a little."

"A little?"

"Three, four miles on the treadmill. Nothing special."

Radek takes a swig from a large, pull-top water bottle. He lifts his shoulders, as if gathering courage. "I have been off world many times since you were…gone. One time these brutish people chased us. Everyone on my team was running except me. I was mostly falling down and waiting for both of my lungs to collapse." He puts his hands to his chest as he tells his story.

Rodney feels a little more short of breath.

"They managed to get in a couple of good smacks before I made it through the gate." With that, he pushes up his sleeve. A long, silvery scar runs down his left forearm. Radek looks around to ensure no one is about and lifts his shirt to reveal marks on his flank that resemble through-and-through bullet holes. Zelenka doesn't talk about the injuries, but his expression darkens in a way that Rodney's never seen before.

"Smacks?" Rodney asks, amazed at Radek's talent for understatement.

Zelenka shrugs. "Elizabeth was quite unhappy. She insisted I begin physical training."

Rodney can't catch his breath much at all, now. He is dizzy and tired and leans a hand against the wall for support.

Radek notices Rodney's distress and starts to take his arm. Rodney pulls away.

"It's nothing. Just a little…" and he rolls his hands around because he really doesn't know what to call it as his lungs hitch up and refuse to operate. Before he knows it, he's down on his ass, holding his hands to the floor in a terrifying battle for his life. He hears Radek calling for medical assistance.

Rodney feels the drinking straw that is his trachea become so narrow that soon it won't begrudge him so much as a sip of air. Carson gave him an inhaler, but McKay's left it in his quarters, along with the oxygen tank. McKay closes his eyes and thinks of air and open spaces and more air.

A line from _The Known World_ comes unbidden to his mind: "I took my first true Breath of Life at the same moment that my newborn son took his, for my existence as a complete being began when he came into the world."

McKay passes out, thinking. 'Breath of Life. Breath of Life. Breath of Life…'

TBC…


	14. Part 2, Chapter 4

**Part 2, Chapter Four**

"We have to go back."

"That's enough, Rodney!"

"Elizabeth, hear me out!"

She crosses her arms, warding off the inevitable.

Although he can't lift a calculator without getting winded, Rodney has suddenly become the poster boy of positive thinkers. Saving John's life is his sole focus. To that end, he lies in the infirmary all day, sucking oxygen from a tank, thinking up ways to bring John back from wherever he's gone.

"The machine's effects…can be reversed. I'm certain of it." Rodney is arguing as well as he can, his voice barely above a hoarse whisper.

"How do you know?"

Here it comes. They've had this discussion before, and this is the point at which Rodney stops making sense.

"I don't know how. I just…know. And you know it." He coughs from his efforts, grips the bedsheets and glances at Carson, who hovers nearby.

Since passing out in the hallway—a frightful experience for everyone concerned, most of all the patient—McKay has failed to respond to treatment. He insists on returning to Kali, to the Institute, for John's sake more than his own. Even so, Elizabeth can't stomach the thought of allowing him or anyone back to the Kalian system, lest they disappear again, this time forever.

"I'm not sending a team back there. I can't risk another disaster."

"It doesn't have to…be a disaster." Rodney refuses to quit, even as his own body fails him. "We know…where to look." He pauses again. "Pistoule said…"

"I _don't_ want to hear about what _Pistoule_ said! You've become obsessed with him, Rodney."

Teyla steps in, since Rodney's sweating with effort and unconsciously rubbing his chest. "A doctor at the Institute may have been able to reverse the machine's effects. There was a treatment for Rodney there as well." She pauses, watching Elizabeth, waiting for her to capitulate.

Rodney signals to Ronon to help him up. He moves to the chair next to Sheppard's bed and brings the oxygen tank with him. He leans over and turns it on. Holding the mask to his face, McKay closes his eyes and takes willfully long, deep breaths.

"He knows we're here?" he asks Beckett.

"Nae, I don't believe so," the doctor replies, scanning the EEG monitor.

"He knows," says Ronon levelly, leaving no room for discussion.

Elizabeth rubs her face, which helps her regain focus. "Isn't there anything you can do for them, Carson?"

He's taken the worst of it, Carson has—failed to reach John, watched Rodney deteriorate. He doesn't mince words or go all kindly on her.

"Nothing I've done has worked so far," he says, snappish so Rodney doesn't have to be. "If you're going to get on with it, then for the love of God, get on with it."

"Rodney's right," says Ronon. "We have to go back." He's been working out, testing his body to see if it's ready for battle. Radek told Elizabeth that Ronon wants to teach him hand-to-hand combat, the real kind, the kind that kills. Radek says that Ronon told him, "You are a great man, Doctor. You should know how to protect yourself."

Teyla doesn't look at Ronon, but keeps her eyes on John. "We must leave as soon as possible."

"See?" McKay's voice is muffled behind the mask. "They want to go. And so do I." His hiccupping breaths don't go unnoticed. Carson approaches but McKay waves him away irritably.

"I'm not sending anybody back there, least of all someone who can't…" she has her hand held there, gesturing toward Rodney. Now that the words are out, she can't gather them up and pretend she meant something different.

"You're giving up." Elizabeth doesn't know whether Rodney means on Sheppard or him or both, but she feels like she's been slapped regardless.

He's gotten very worked up. Panting and everything.

"Rodney, you are asking me to send more people into harm's way."

Teyla steps forward. "We must go. Ronon and I are friendly with people at the Institute, with the doctors there."

"Colonel Caldwell and I will discuss the matter," is all she can muster. They think that she is bullshitting them when all she really wants to do is keep them close. "Honestly. I will think about it and let you know of my decision."

"When?" Rodney presses the O2 mask tightly against his face. Teyla rubs his back as Carson hauls a stethoscope from his pocket and presses it to McKay's back.

"Soon," she replies. Everyone looks at her. Elizabeth remembers the photographs of atrocities, sees in Ronon's and Rodney's and Teyla's eyes the same half-conquered looks. They are like busted-up furniture, waiting to be fixed or else taken away and burned.

The decision ought to be hers. She wants it to be hers. But Rodney makes it for her when he can't hold himself up any longer. The choice is made the moment he slips sideways and collapses to the floor, gasping a few times like a fish pulled from the water, and then lying still. Carson shouts orders to his staff, and, with Elizabeth's and Teyla's and Ronon's help, Rodney is moved to a bed. Then Beckett pushes them aside and draws the curtain.

They remain in the middle of the infirmary, Atlantis's leader and the last two standing members of Sheppard's team. Nurses scoot around behind the drape, assisting Carson with the cruelties of kindness, the needles and catheters and, finally, Elizabeth hears an ominous hiss-click that fills her with dread.

Ronon walks to the curtain and peeks behind it. Elizabeth knows what he's seeing; the Satedan's face tells the entire story. He looks at Teyla, his expression transcending speech.

The Athosian nods at her teammate and turns to Elizabeth. "We are going back," she says.

"Yes," Elizabeth responds. "You are."

OoOoO

Carson Beckett has finished packing. Sheppard and McKay are coming along on this mission, so that any useful cures can be administered without delay. Lots of people who don't usually end up on the huge ship are taking part in the effort to save these two. Carson has to smile at that, because it was getting to the point where he was going to steal a jumper and go to Kali by himself if he had to.

Sheppard and McKay lie on cots side by side, awaiting beam transport along with Carson and the specialized equipment he's made ready.

"Colonel Sheppard," he says to the unconscious man. "You're going on a wee trip. Everything's packed up for you, so don't worry."

Sheppard doesn't respond, of course.

"It's five days out and five days back. I don't know how long we'll be there, really. It'll do you good to get out a bit. Rodney's coming along, as well, so you'll have someone to keep you company…"

But he doesn't really mean it like that and winces at his choice of words. Rodney's on the vent, now, which is going hiss-click-hiss-click over and over, keeping his O2 saturation at 89 percent. It should be higher, but that's pretty good for a dying man.

Zelenka was in earlier. He looked like he wanted to visit with Rodney, but ended up just standing at the infirmary door, his gaze going from Rodney to John and back again. Elizabeth did the same thing about an hour before.

This is a last-ditch effort. If it fails, Carson prays that Rodney and Sheppard will live long enough to return to Atlantis. They love this city and the people in it. Both want to die here. At some point, each of them told him so.

Carson hasn't given up hope, yet. "Don't worry, John. We'll find a way to help you," he says. "Rodney, as well. He fought for this, I'll say that. Fought until there was barely a breath left in his body. Now we're all going to fight for the both of you."

"Doctor Beckett?" Caldwell's voice reaches his headset, calling from the Daedalus's bridge.

"Beckett. Go ahead."

"Are you and your patients ready for transport?"

Ronon and Teyla join their teammates as Beckett responds in the affirmative, more certain of this than of anything in his life. They are all together. Atlantis is their world, right now. In a second they will be gone from this beloved place. Some may not return alive.

Beckett closes his eyes against the transporter's white glare, until he feels the Daedalus beneath his feet. Ronon and Sheppard and Teyla and McKay make a new tableau, one that comes into focus a thousand miles above the city. Beckett can move, but he doesn't. No one moves at all because they can't leave this moment without making it last just a little longer.

End Part 2

TBC…

_**A/N:** So ends Part 2. The third part, "A Unified Theory of Life," will be posted at the same rate as everything that came before it, one chapter every other day, if not sooner. Thanks to all of the readers who have come this far. The last leg of the journey is about to begin._


	15. Part 3, Chapter 1

**The Known World**

**Part 3: A Unified Theory of Life**

"Force secrets from the dark corners where they live. Pry them out, and hang them up in the light of truth. In so doing, we will know each other and become as one."—"Essay on a Unified Theory of Life,"_ The Known World_, p. 509.

**Chapter One**

John dreams that he lives in a small house, a cottage, with thin, white curtains and a green, braided rug. He laughs with children who like him. They play out in the natural world, not in the Play Yard. He scurries through the woods and then stomps in a shallow stream as water trickles over pebbles and little branches and clotted leaves. Late in the day, when the children are very tired, they lie in a field of _massin_ grass and watch clouds drift by overhead.

When John dreams, he is in another person's small life. He sees the faces of his departed mother--may her soul be blessed--his teachers and many others. Texts flash before his eyes, diagrams, treatises on science and on music and on understanding so deep that sometimes words become unnecessary. John, in this other life, calls to his father.

When John's brain is dead, he knows nothing at all.

In between these two states, the people he loves in another lifetime speak to him, sometimes speak about him. He feels their hands on his body, tending him, connecting with him. Sometimes he feels these beloved people even when they are not touching him, if they simply stand nearby.

The in-between times last a few seconds before the dreams come or before nothingness happens. John lives many lives, right now.

OoOoO

The thing was once a drinking cup. Now it's a hardened glob of melted plastic. Ronon recognizes it because he drank from many plastic drinking cups when he was here. He looks further into the bombed-out building, stepping over blackened roof trusses and twisted-up things that may have been bed frames.

"Do you remember the location of the medical library?"

Lorne stands beside Ronon, his P90 pointed down but at the ready. They have reached the Institute's dead center, the place that once led off to other rooms.

One of these rooms contained stair steps, which Ronon practiced ascending and descending, and horizontal bars bolted to the floor so that he had something to hold on to while Nevillus helped him to stand and walk again.

Ronon hears, _"You know how I love you…"_ and stops his mind from going there.

"This way," he says, pointing up ahead, turning away from memories of betraying his friend.

They reach the place where books and medical records were stored, but find that whatever destroyed the building did as good a job on the library as it did on everything else. Nothing useable remains; the walls lie in pieces, a jumbled ruin. In a blown-out closet near the wards, disinfectants and shaving supplies form congealed messes where they burned together; in the pharmacy, ashes are all that remain of the precious formulae incinerated by the white-hot blasts that consumed the Mann Institute.

Water drips from broken pipes, the sound magnified by the incongruous tranquility. Teyla turns up her nose at the rank smell of burnt things made soggy by the leaking water.

Four other Lanteans accompany Lorne and Ronon, Teyla among them.

"I have found no medicine anywhere. All of it has been destroyed," she says.

"No records on the machine, either," Ronon responds.

They look at each other, painfully aware that they had placed every dram of hope in this place, in the people and things that once existed here.

Ruiz and Lorne have never been to Kali before. They were instructed to be wary of everything, but their attention is repeatedly drawn to the treeline. Ronon thinks they may have an inkling of what he's been picking up for a good half-hour, now, as his hearing is more acute than that of anyone he has ever met.

Two people are watching the Lantean landing party. The Runner hears them clearly, as though they were standing beside him.

Ronon steps from the rubble and wanders in a casual fashion. He passes the tree under which he, Teyla and McKay ate a picnic lunch as the physicist quoted from Pistoule's book. The grass underfoot is longer than it was the day that Teyla ran laps on it, the day they rescued Sheppard and were blown out into space.

The whispering increases.

"No, no! Stay low! He will see you!" says one.

"They come for us! I am afraid!" says the other, whispering furtively.

"Stay by my side. I will protect you."

Ronon notices a few shrubs at the edge of the forest shaking as the people hiding behind them agitate.

"No, no, give that back to me!"

A high-powered energy burst emerges from the vegetation and swoops past Ronon's head. He dives and rolls, his gun up and aimed.

The frenzied whispers take on even more urgency.

"Doctor, the weapon was to chase off _botri_ cats! Predators! Now you have given us away. How could you do this?"

"Shoot him, shoot him, shoot him!" It is the pleading, keening voice of Dinstard Pistoule.

"The weapon is empty, now, my friend."

Ronon stands. "Doctor Pistoule, Andol? You don't remember me?"

A pause. Then, "Ronon Dex?"

He nods.

From behind their paltry shelter emerge the physicist and Andol, who drove Nevillus and Ronon to the jumper that day.

"You look different," Andol says, indicating Ronon's regrowing hair and beard.

"Hear that a lot, lately."

As Ronon and Lorne's team gather about him, Pistoule becomes more unsettled. He stands with his hands clasped together, held tightly under his chin, as if he were fervently praying. He shifts his weight from one foot to the other in a manic dance. Large brown eyes bear the same confused anxiety that Ronon has always seen in them.

"Is he better?" Ronon asks Andol, for it is hard to tell with someone so damaged and distraught.

"A little. His treatment incomplete." Andol points to what remains of the Institute. "You left to find your friend on the moon. We heard that you had all perished. Then the government destroyed the Institute and sent people to prison. Dr. Mann was killed outright with the first blast. His records, the medications used to treat Dr. Pistoule, all gone."

Hope lights Andol's eyes.

"You did not die on the moon. Is my dear friend Nevillus alive, as well?"

_The transport shudders and dead Nevillus shakes his head, nononononono…_

"He didn't suffer," Ronon answers.

Andol places his hands to his face and steps away. Dinstard Pistoule follows, calling after him.

"Andol? What is wrong? Are you sad, Andol?"

What began as a day of optimism has brought only despair. Ronon thinks of Sheppard silently fading away; he thinks of McKay and the machine that is breathing for him. The Institute and its doctors are gone and, with them, the last glimmer of hope for his friends has vanished.

Ronon would have heard the missile even if a truck were rolling by his head. The escalating scream of incoming warheads is a sound he came to know very well on Sateda, when the Wraith stole his life. He can detect a dart from many miles away and he knows the sound of a missile, as well.

"Take cover!" he shouts, a full six seconds before the rest of the team hears the whistling threat as it comes for them.

The missile lands off target, closer to the gutted Institute than to the few people standing in the field in front of it.

"Macon!" Lorne is up and shouting into his comm.

"_I'm on it!_" Macon replies.

Pistoule comes unglued. He flaps his arms about, babbles nonsense, then drops to the ground and clutches at the grass, pulling out clumps of it.

"We die!" he cries. "Andol, we must hide the volumes! Help me dig!"

Andol will have none of that. He grabs Pistoule and pulls him towards the treeline. "We will hide there!"

Another missile lands nearby, throwing both men off their feet. Andol leaps up but quits his run to the trees as Ronon waves him over. He seizes Pistoule and pulls him to Ronon's side.

"It is the government people!" Andol shouts to Ronon, as they flop belly-down in a shallow dip in the land. "They are always watching here. They wait for traitors, for people like you. We escaped the bombing, came back today to mourn our departed friends and hoped not to be seen, but, oh, we shall die now!"

In the quiet between sorties, Lorne fingers his headset.

"Macon, where the hell are you?"

"_I'm almost in position…_"

More shells land nearby, making little earthquakes, forming ugly pits and tunnels in the lush, grassy field. Ronon's head throbs from the concussive explosions. No foot soldiers appear; the Kalians fight with technology this time, instead of with people.

Andol has his hands full with Pistoule, who thrashes around in his unthinking terror. He rips himself out of Andol's grasp and skids across the field toward the treeline. His caretaker climbs up after him.

"Dr. Pistoule, please come back!" Andol calls, paying no heed to his own safety. He is slower than the doctor and, as he runs, his breathless voice is obscured by the thunderous drone of another approaching salvo. Then it ends with a sharp cry as a screaming missile plummets to the ground beside Andol's racing feet, detonating and pulverizing everything within twenty yards of its point of impact.

Dirt and rocks and other loose things fall from the sky onto Ronon, onto Teyla and everyone else. Ronon lies stunned and almost deaf, until Dinstard Pistoule's high-pitched keening cry fades in. The Kalian kneels at the edge of the blast crater, digging his stubby hands into the sifted earth, clutching at bits of Andol, and crying like a small child lost and frightened in a crowd.

"There!" Lorne points to Ronon's left, at the vague, swimming image of the uncloaking jumper with Macon at the controls. Its back drops agonizingly slowly, as Ronon gets his feet up underneath himself and speeds toward it.

"We must bring Pistoule!" Teyla calls to her teammate. He sees her sprint to catch the little physicist, who spins from her grasp.

"No!" he shouts, cradling soil from the crater to his chest.

A missile approaches. Ronon hears it. Although the armed rocket is still far away, it is coming, and it will be the death of them all.

"Teyla, hurry!" He realizes just how ridiculously unnecessary it is to say this, but can't help himself.

To Ronon's vast relief, Teyla subdues the writhing Pistoule with a hard smack across his face, then pulls the stunned little man to the jumper and doesn't let him go even after shoving him inside, forcing him to sit and pressing her body across his to keep him still. He howls in outrage as the missile Ronon knew was coming collides with the ground, blowing the rising jumper into an ungainly yaw. The pilot re-cloaks and rights the ship, letting it run full-out before the next missile volley reaches the craft.

Ronon focuses on the windscreen, as the cerulean blue sky darkens to azure, then deep ocean blue and, finally, to inky black dotted with hopeful stars. Memories of other escapes turn his stomach, as he waits for the jumper to split open and send him tumbling, waits for the window to shatter and for his trauma to begin again.

Pistoule crouches on the bench seat, his bony knees pulled up to his chin. He rocks and rocks and his large eyes stare out at nothing.

Teyla, pale and shaking, revisiting her own dark horror, sits next to Pistoule. She pulls the broken man tight to her side and mutters kind, reassuring words, perhaps speaking for her own benefit as well as his. Even though she slapped him, even though she was rough with him, Pistoule accepts her comfort, which surprises Ronon and Lorne and the rest.

Pistoule cries softly. He says, "They killed him. I must get him back. Please…" He sounds as if the weight of the world rests upon him. He clutches at Teyla's clothing, claws with dirty, nail-bitten fingers at her tac vest. She looks at him as if the weight of the world sat right there, next to her on the bench seat, rocking and rocking and rocking.

OoOoO

It takes the cloaked jumper two hours to reach the Daedalus, which hangs back to avoid detection and this time, fortunately, didn't have to scoop up anyone from space. Two interminable hours, during which Pistoule mutters and has tirades. Teyla tries to control him. She watches after Pistoule because everyone else gives him a wide berth, as though his condition were contagious.

Aside from the destroyed genius, the mission acquired exactly nothing of any value. And Pistoule doesn't seem like much of a prize. He hallucinates. He jumps and trembles at sudden sounds. He rocks with his eyes squeezed shut, sucks on his fingers until they are soft and wrinkly.

Once the exhausted jumper crew reaches the Daedalus, Caldwell takes one look at what remains of Kali's most brilliant man and suggests sedation to keep Pistoule out of trouble.

Carson won't hear of this and says as much. Teyla can barely control her fury. "He has been victimized by the worst sorts of people," she tells Caldwell, barely restraining herself from smacking him. "I will not allow him to be mistreated."

"Then _you_ look after him!" Caldwell retorts.

Teyla lifts her chin. "I intend to. He is not here by choice. We have a responsibility to protect him."

"Where is our guest right now?" Caldwell asks Carson.

"In the infirmary. If Dr. Pistoule has been subjected to the same process as the Colonel, it behooves us to get as much information on his condition as possible."

There are polite nods around the room. Teyla is civil. The mission failed. She doesn't raise her voice because this is how things go sometimes. Sometimes people you love can't be cured or fixed or brought back to the light.

The meeting ends. Teyla speaks to no one as she walks to the infirmary. Pistoule is still there, curled up on an exam table, when she arrives. Before seeing to him, Teyla follows her habit, draws away the curtain around Sheppard's bed and sits beside her friend. She tells him about the mission to the Institute, what happened there.

"Poor boy." Pistoule has moved from the exam room and come to stand beside John Sheppard. He stares down in wonderment at the ailing man.

"Dr. Pistoule?" Teyla inquires. "Do you know the Colonel?"

"Poor boy," Pistoule repeats, tears springing to his eyes, as he strokes John's face, gently traces a finger down along his jaw line. "Your homeless soul," he says, taking John's hand and holding it close, his destitute voice drained of hope.

"This must be hard for you," Teyla says to the little Kalian. "The machine is a terrible thing."

"Yes," Pistoule replies. "Vile." He is lost in his thoughts, lost in his mournful touching.

John lies in the bed, his chest rising and falling like always. One of his fingers moves; he takes a deeper breath but does not awaken.

The journey back to Atlantis aboard the Daedalus is expected to take five days. A pall falls over the infirmary. Pistoule refuses to leave John's side. He caresses the Colonel's forehead and whispers lamentations to him, even though John probably can't hear. When Teyla sees the two together, she wonders whether they knew each other at the prison, and how close they may have been. When she inquires about this, the scholar doesn't respond.

On the other side of the room, the ventilator breathing for Rodney hisses and clicks.

Both of her friends are dying before Teyla's eyes. The Daedalus heads back to Atlantis with no cure for McKay and no treatment for what the machine did to John. Pistoule has not stepped out of his shell long enough to answer even the simplest question about it.

_John kneels, Rodney shivers, the Warden whispers in her ear…_

Pistoule's voice trembles, tears spill down his cheeks. He holds John's hand and says to him, "Come back," as if to pull him awake by will alone. This is exactly how Teyla feels, and sometimes she has to go out into the hallway and sometimes she just stands there and doesn't even try to pull herself together.

OoOoO

The Daedalus has traveled approximately one-third of the way to Atlantis. Today Teyla comes to the infirmary to find Pistoule sitting in a chair near Rodney's bed. He rocks in the chair and stares at McKay, who hasn't garnered much of his attention until now. He rocks and rocks, knees up against his chest, his hands folded and tucked under his chin. His pensive expression reveals a flicker of the genius for which he is famous.

Slowly, Pistoule stretches out one leg and places his foot on the floor. He places the other foot. Then he stands and creeps over to the bed in which McKay lies. Teyla watches him and follows.

"Do you remember Dr. McKay?" she asks. "He is a great admirer of your work."

The Kalian picks up McKay's hand and rubs his thumb along the back. He turns it over and traces his finger along McKay's faded life line. He seems lost in this, as though he were picking up messages through Rodney's skin.

She tells him. "Rodney became ill while in prison, but seemed to recover at the Institute. Since we left he has gotten worse and now…" She doesn't finish because it is obvious how Rodney is doing.

Still, Teyla wants to tell Pistoule things for McKay, because her friend can't say them for himself.

"Before his illness overtook him, Rodney had hoped to reverse the machine's effects on Colonel Sheppard."

This time Teyla can't bring herself to look at John. She tried so hard to save him, to save Rodney, and parceled out a huge chunk of herself to ensure their safety, and now they're close to death anyway.

Pistoule holds his hand to McKay's chest as the vent does its work. "Very sick," he mutters.

Teyla is beyond coping with this tragedy. "Yes. He is…" she says. "He is dying."

Her vision blurs as grief washes over her. Then hands cup her face and Pistoule is there, wiping tears from her cheeks with his thumbs. She takes a step back, unaccustomed to such intimacy, forgetting that Kalians like to touch, but he moves with her and doesn't let go.

"It is in…dark places," he says, stumbling over his words. "You will…find it there."

"Find what?"

"The cure!" He smiles broadly.

Teyla says nothing, but waits for him to finish.

"'The cure for all ills…lies in the forests and in…and in the streams and in dark and …secret places.'"

Level sanity flickers off and on, off and on, in his eyes. Pistoule has just quoted himself. He leans in very close in to whisper to her. His words brush against her ear.

"Loza," he breathes. "Loza."

TBC…


	16. Part 3, Chapter 2

_**A/N: Warning: Bugs**. Not too terribly graphic, however. Be strong. You're only reading about them. Imagine having to catch them!_

**Part 3, Chapter Two**

"We have to go back."

"Oh, for crying…"

"Not to the planet, Colonel. To the moon this time."

Each second that the Daedalus travels away from the Kalian system is a second closer to McKay coding. Carson Beckett is stressed beyond measure because of it.

Caldwell stands before him, arms crossed, his face squinched with the pained expression that he carries everywhere these days. His back is hurting. He needs meds, rest and, quite possibly, traction. Carson doesn't give a shit.

"Turn it around. We have to get to the moon as quickly as possible."

"Why?"

"Loza bugs."

"Bugs, did you say?"

Carson manages a tight smile and nods because this is so unbelievably far-fetched he never could have thought it up on his own. It took a raving lunatic to do that.

"Sounds strange, I know. But we have to go back."

"To pick up some bugs?"

"Loza bugs. Pistoule has indicated that they contain a substance that will cure Rodney."

Caldwell's eyes roll so emphatically that Carson can practically hear them squeaking in their sockets.

"Bugs?"

The Colonel's back is spasming so badly it's twisting up towards the left. It pains Carson to see the man so literally bent out of shape, but Caldwell will live, as surely as Rodney will die if something isn't done soon.

"And what are you supposed to do with these bugs?"

Carson tries to keep the total cluelessness out of his expression…and fails.

"I won't know until I have the little…buggers," he says, at last. "Maybe it's obvious."

The Colonel rubs the small of his back and shifts his shoulders as he relents and orders the Daedalus around. Carson's read reports documenting Caldwell's unsuccessful trials using the Goa'uld healing device, frowned as he read about failed excursions into the easy way out. Terms like "corrupted marker" and so forth sprang from the pages.

Caldwell asks, "How do we find these bugs?"

"Teyla has seen them in the prison, lots of them. Beam in a team, catch bugs, beam everyone out."

"You have some way to contain them, I hope. Don't want them crawling all over the ship."

"We're working on…"

"How big are they?"

"Pardon?"

Caldwell takes a shuddering breath. "They're not like spiders, I hope. I really hate spiders."

Carson can't believe how well Steven Caldwell is channeling Rodney McKay right now. "Teyla says that they are much smaller than iratus bugs."

"Comforting," Caldwell says, lamely.

OoOoO

"Are those _teeth_?" Macon asks.

Teyla shrugs. She grew up out of doors. Bugs don't bother her, even large ones like lozas.

Each member of this five-person team carries makeshift beetle bags fashioned from sharps containers. It is the dead of night, when nothing roams the halls in this part of the prison but loza bugs and other insects, looking for food and opportunities to mate.

Lozas attempt to skitter away from grabbing hands, but they are not fast enough, even with six long legs to carry them. Their large bodies waddle, full of food and full of the toxin-cure sloshing around inside of them.

Legs snap off and go flying as Teyla shoves the insects into one of her sharps containers. The Marines, Macon and Hartwell, back off to prevent loza legs from striking them. Macon dons latex exam gloves, and everyone looks at him with an I-wish-I'd-thought-of-that expression.

Lozas crawl up the walls. Masses of them hide in dark corners, lying together asleep, or merely watching.

The Daedalus orbits far above. Caldwell and Novak and dozens of others nervously track their people on the moon. They are on radio silence. No one is certain of how well the Kalians can see the ship or if they have detected it at all.

Teyla and the members of Lorne's team grab at bugs, shove them into the containers. Some of the bugs burst when handled. Their insides stink.

Ronon is on hallway patrol. Teyla insists. She wants to spare him the indignity of messing with lozas and needs his finely tuned senses to warn of danger. The prep room just off the kitchen is good for catching some bugs, but most prefer lavatories, wet places like that. The lav next to the prep room yields a few dozen bugs. Enough? Not enough? Teyla wasn't told. She will take as many as she can find.

Macon pants as he breathes through his mouth to avoid the smell.

"Try it. It works," he tells Hartwell.

"What, and get cavities?" his mate replies.

Bugs fill two sharps containers, then three, then four. Some of the captured bugs are still alive. Their brittle exoskeletons and other parts screak against the insides of the plastic bins.

"We have enough?" Lorne asks, shaking his container and watching the bugs through the hole in its top.

"No," Teyla replies, going with her gut. "He will need more."

The Major looks at her questioningly but doesn't protest as she continues to search the bathroom. She is glad that Lorne's choosing to listen to her. He has never set foot in this place his whole life long. Teyla still hasn't left it, yet.

On occasion, after the Warden fell asleep, Teyla was permitted to use the lav next to the room with the bed in it. The walls and floor there undulated with swarms of lozas. Teyla had to push them out of her way with her foot so that she wouldn't step on them. They will go to this place next, for she recalls nowhere as full of bugs as the lav next to the bedroom.

Ronon takes their six; Teyla is on point. She climbs the stairs and makes her way down the corridor to the Warden's office, and the miserable memories that it contains.

Doors line this hallway as they do every other in the facility. Some doors have signs painted onto them, signs that say things like "Deviants" and "Pacifists" and "Feminists."

When Teyla and the team reach the Warden's bath, it is as always, crawling with lozas. Ronon watches Teyla, but she doesn't meet his stare. They both knew that this mission might require a visit to the Warden's quarters, where Ronon found her the night he stormed the prison to rescue Pistoule. To relieve some of her stress at returning to this awful place, Teyla squeezes each loza as she shoves it into the container and feels it die between her fingers.

So far, the mission is succeeding. The team has collected a lot of bugs, maybe enough, maybe not. When asked about quantities, Pistoule had said, "Very many," and left it at that.

The Warden's bath is picked clean of bugs, but Macon and Hartwell have one container each that still needs to be filled. Teyla directs them to another lav down the hallway beyond the Warden's office. Doors along this part of the hall have signs that read "Sympathizers" and "Liberals" and "Terrorists."

And one of them reads "Pistoule."

As lozas tumble around in the containers she holds in her arms, Teyla stares. She can scarcely begin to speak of what might lie behind this door, which is metal and thicker and stronger than the others. Even if Teyla had known of this place while she was imprisoned, she did not know then who Pistoule was and could not have predicted how important he would become.

Ronon shoulders the door, which doesn't even shake.

"What do you think's in there?" he asks Teyla.

She has no idea, only the same hope that she felt when they returned to the Institute on Kali. "Information. Medicine, perhaps."

"The machine?" he queries.

Lorne watches this exchange. He's becoming impatient and keeps looking up and down the hall, perhaps expecting death to come marching up the stairway at any moment.

He says, "C4," as if he were offering them pieces of chewing gum.

Hartwell and Macon duck into the bath and begin collecting bugs, as many as they can in the few moments before the plastique is detonated. Teyla and Ronon pack the containers filled so far into rucksacks. They look at each other, understanding each other by intuition. They must charge the room once the door is opened and find out what they can before the alarms that will surely be triggered summon disciplinarians to stop them. This is their only chance.

The C4 charges blow the door right off of its hinges and the metal slab flies back and lands somewhere inside the room with a reverberating boom. As expected, shrill alarms sound, echoing through every corridor, making an unholy racket.

Teyla dashes in, as Lorne alerts the Daedalus that they have just summoned every guard the prison employs to their location.

"Say again?" Caldwell barks.

"You heard me, Sir. We're searching the room now. Prepare beam transport to engage on our signal."

The room marked "Pistoule" contains nothing but a chair and a wood table with a plain-looking metal box resting on it.

"This is the machine?" Lorne yells, trying to make himself heard above the piercing cacophony.

"I do not know!" Teyla hollers back.

"Take it and let's get out of here!"

Teyla lifts the box, which awakens at her touch, humming and vibrating excitedly. She doesn't want to hold this thing. It could be dangerous or it could play music, there is no way to tell. But she holds the box anyway, in case it's what John needs.

A disciplinarian bolts through the doorway, stun rod raised, catching Lorne and sending him down in a shower of yellow sparks. Not the highest setting by a long shot, but strong enough. More disciplinarians shove inside, waving rods, aiming energy weapons. Hartwell fires and kills one man, fires and misses another before taking a stun and going down, as well.

A disciplinarian aims and fires at Teyla. She jerks her body to avoid the pulse and ends up placing the metal box in the line of fire. The weapon blows a hole in the box, impacts with enough force to send Teyla off sideways, stumbling across the small room towards a waiting disciplinarian, who places his stun rod to her side and gives her a charge so strong it takes her breath away.

Ronon catches the box as it flies from her hands and slams it and an elbow into her attacker. He touches his headset and the noise of the alarm drowns out what he's saying. Then he reaches for Teyla, who lies spasming on the floor, close to passed out, when the transporter beam picks her up, picks up all of them, and takes them away from the prison for the last time.

TBC…


	17. Part 3, Chapter 3

**_A/N: Warning: Bugs, again. A little more graphic than in the previous chapter, but I've tried to be gentle._**

_My thanks to Inkling, Pranksta and Aslowhite for their betaing skills. Any and all typos are mine._

**Part 3, Chapter Three**

Teyla sleeps off the stun rod as the Daedalus speeds toward Atlantis. Pistoule has taken a shine to the Athosian and sits with her. Whatever small treatment he received at the Institute has helped him become more outgoing with someone he likes.

When Teyla awakens, he pushes her hair out of her face. She smiles at the kindly genius.

"I waited for you," Pistoule says, with abundant sincerity.

Carson curses in the next room. He is trying to dissect a loza, but the frustratingly fragile bug bursts into smelly, green-black goo when he puts scalpel to carapace. The infirmary stinks with the sour evidence of his many attempts to accomplish this task. Fed up, Carson takes not one, but several trays with the exploded bugs on them over to the vent hood and turns it on.

"It's about time," he says, as Pistoule approaches with Teyla drawn up beside him.

"He seems more comfortable when I am nearby," Teyla says.

With a sigh of relief, Carson relinquishes the trays of loza bug sludge into Pistoule's care. With bare hands, the little Kalian crushes up everything into even smaller bits. He mixes some water with the mess and squishes the bugs even more until the bottom of each tray has a layer of loza-bug puree on it. It smells even worse, now. Because Pistoule doesn't have full control of his fine motor movement, he unintentionally flings droplets of loza everywhere. Each little pinpoint reeks to high heaven.

McKay is becoming agitated and more hypoxic as his lungs die inside of him. Over Carson's weak objections, Pistoule maneuvers around the vent and places a small amount of the bug goop between McKay's lower lip and gum. It spreads out some, leaking into the capillary-rich tissues. Pistoule places Carson's fingers against McKay's chin, showing him how to keep the dollop of bug stuff in place.

Several minutes later, Pistoule opens McKay's mouth. The liquid has disappeared and only the pulp remains. This is scooped out and replaced with another half-teaspoon of loza bug puree.

Pistoule says, "All of it," and hands the tray to Carson, who sputters in disbelief.

"_This?_" he says, holding his hand under his nose to ward off the evil smell. "You're joking."

Pistoule smiles. "Simple sickness. Simple cure."

OoOoO

Like many other medicines, the bug-cure is toxic. McKay is sick to begin with. Carson's nervously putting his trust in someone who cries when he hears loud noises. The doctor is uneasy giving McKay crushed-up exploded bugs to cure him because he doesn't have a whole lot of faith in this.

An hour into the treatment, McKay spikes a high fever. His cheeks turn bright red and his pupils dilate.

Pistoule forgets about McKay and turns his attention, what there is of it, to the machine. Or what they think may be the machine. It was discovered by accident, so only Pistoule would know for certain, and he has quit talking for the day.

All night McKay is treated with loza bugs. Teyla takes over after a while, then Ronon, then the nurses. They take turns, a few hours each. They talk to McKay, tell him that when he wakes up he won't believe for a second how he got better.

Ronon and Teyla are with McKay most of all. They don't always speak much. The team is so tightly knit, now, that they seem to have their own language, based on touch, based on things that make no sound.

Someone stays with McKay, feeding him loza, all night and all day the next day and all night the following night. On occasion, McKay moves his arms about, or tries to open his eyes. His fever lingers and each hour he looks less and less alive.

The second night, a little less than halfway back to Atlantis, Carson goes in search of Pistoule to find out how long until the crap they're giving McKay starts working. The little man paces the quarters set up for him, with the machine situated on the floor in the center of the room.

When the machine was first handed to him, Pistoule sobbed at the sight of it. Recovered, now, he walks around the machine, around and around it for hours. He stops from time to time to shake in his spastic, unintentional way, then goes back to pacing around the machine, lost in thought. One side of the box bears a hole where the weapon blast damaged it. On occasion, he fingers the blast hole, mutters something to himself. He is doing this when Carson Beckett comes to see him.

"That stuff isn't working," Carson says without preamble, too tired and worried to be pleasant. "McKay's not any better. He's feverish. You need to see him."

The Kalian doesn't say anything in response, just resumes walking around and around the machine. He waves his hand at Carson, shooing him away, but Carson doesn't leave.

After a while, Pistoule becomes annoyed. He stomps down to the infirmary, where he checks the blob of loza goo in McKay's mouth. His expression doesn't change much from pondering the machine to pondering Rodney.

Carson has reached the end of his patience, can't bear to listen to the vent forcing air into Rodney's decaying lungs.

"If you don't know what you're doing then you should say so. Or you should have done nothing at all, so Rodney can die in peace."

"The machine," Pistoule says. He peers around Carson, across the way to where John lies. "It is very important…" His voice trails off and he steps over to the Colonel.

Carson follows and speaks to him gently, as the small Kalian takes John's hand in his usual way and his eyes shine with unshed tears. "Aye, the machine is vital," he says. "But Rodney is dying. Look at him…"

Pistoule looks up from John and casts his eyes at Rodney for a moment, then turns to Carson, as if noticing him for the very first time.

"Broken," he says. "It will take time to fix them."

OoOoO

Early on the fourth day by the Daedalus's clock—because the sun neither rises nor sets in hyperspace—Ronon comes to the infirmary to take over "bug duty" from Teyla. Standing in the doorway preparing himself, Ronon sees Teyla remove and discard some used-up pulp and put another bit in to take its place. When she sees Ronon, Teyla stands and pauses to stretch her back.

"You sore?" he asks.

"Some," she replies.

She bends from side to side, squares up her shoulders as if preparing for a fight.

"Any change?" he asks, already knowing the answer.

Teyla shakes her head. Ronon sits beside McKay. He squints into the bowl of smelly stuff but says nothing about it. All of the jokes about this cure stopped being funny a long time ago.

"Pistoule is working on the machine. Says it's the one used on Sheppard," he says, donning exam gloves to keep his hands clean and to keep McKay from picking up stray microbes.

"We were fortunate to locate it," Teyla says, discarding her own gloves into a biohazard bin.

"Yeah. Lucky." Ronon doesn't like that word very much, especially now.

As is usual for her, Teyla sits with Sheppard after tending to Rodney. On most days, she lays her hand on him and speaks with him in a conversational way. Today, she holds his hand without saying anything. Then she looks up at Ronon.

"Do you believe that everything happens for a reason?" she asks.

He thinks about this. Then he says, "Not everything."

"If I had not gone where I knew we would find plenty of loza bugs, we would not have known that a room marked 'Pistoule' existed."

He nods.

Teyla hasn't mentioned her experiences in the Kalian prison since she and Ronon ate cake together in Atlantis.

"I am settled about what I did," she says. "John or Rodney would not be."

"They wouldn't think less of you."

She shakes her head. "I know that. They would think less of themselves. They would tell me I ought to have let them die than submit as I did."

Ronon understands this on a visceral level. His life, once so singularly focused on self-preservation, is now part of an ever-expanding circle of self-sacrifice. Given a choice between submission and seeing his friends slaughtered…

"I would've done the same as you," he tells her.

Ronon thinks that Teyla towers so far above him he can never hope to reach that high.

"I would have done the same _for_ you, too," he adds.

OoOoO

It is late in the fourth day of treatment.

Hiss-click-hiss-click…

Someone holds his hand and says, "Rodney…"

Just listening to them drains him.

Someone says, "Sats are up to ninety-four percent…"

Hiss-click-hiss-click…

Someone places the chilly bell of a stethoscope on his chest. A warm hand follows. The light pressure feels like both a comfort and a burden.

Hiss-click…

And then, Teyla says, "He is much better, Dr. Pistoule. You may speak to him if you wish."

The hiss-click is gone. Rodney opens his eyes to blurry faces. Teyla's blurry face, and Ronon's and Carson's and, strangely enough, Dinstard Pistoule's. Only a little puff of air comes out when McKay tries to speak. He wants to ask about Sheppard, but that doesn't happen, either…

Next Rodney knows, he's struggling to breathe, and it's all intake, intake, intake and nothing's going out. He tries to sit up perfectly straight but they push him back, push him flat.

"Hold him down," Carson says.

It's terrible this way…

"…off the vent a wee bit too early, but he's settled down, now. We'll reach Atlantis in sixteen hours." McKay hears the Carson-end of a conversation with Elizabeth. "I'm placing Colonel Caldwell on medical leave once we return. Oh, yeah, I'm dead serious…"

Again, he sleeps.

The next time Rodney opens his eyes, only Pistoule is there. The small man holds a tiny metal cube in his hand. McKay has a non-rebreather over his nose and mouth. He doesn't hear the hiss-click anymore.

Pistoule lifts away the mask for a moment and hangs the cube around Rodney's neck. Then he replaces the mask. His hands shake, which in turn makes McKay feel a little nervous.

A bright light surrounds him and there is suddenly a lot of movement. That is when Rodney realizes that he has returned to Atlantis. He has never felt so happy to be home.

Teyla wakes him next. She sits beside him on the bed and he feels the warmth of her, the way she is able to connect with him. He remembers how they sat against the cinderblock wall, trying to reach each other. He nods off for a few minutes, then starts awake. He tries very hard to be fully in the moment, and manages to say, "Shhhhh," which he hopes is close enough.

"He is the same," she says. "We located the machine, but it is damaged. Dr. Pistoule is attempting to repair it." She fingers the cube hanging by a chain around Rodney's neck. "He gave you this."

It is a little thing, silvery, with miniscule inscriptions on each side. A gift that he probably doesn't deserve, the cube is a poor substitute for the news that he had hoped to hear.

Their conversation is fairly one-sided, since McKay can't talk much. He is given a datapad to type onto, but is so exhausted from his long battle to stay alive that working with the pad wipes him out.

Teyla describes the battle on Kali that led to Pistoule's coming to Atlantis. She also reveals the means by which McKay is being healed. He remembers the horrid loza bugs from the prison and holds Teyla's wrist until the nausea passes.

Finally, Teyla gives up on talking and waiting for him to type stuff and just looks at him. She did this before, when he was at the Institute. Her eyes reflect a loyalty so strong, he wonders where it came from.

OoOoO

Zelenka visits later on. He sits on the edge of McKay's bed.

McKay whispers, "How's it going, Radek?"

Zelenka lifts the cube.

Rodney types, _P. gave it to me_.

"Do you know what it is? What it contains?"

Zelenka is so serious, so focused and direct about this. McKay shakes his head and waits.

"It is like a high-capacity flash drive and it holds every single work that Dr. Pistoule has ever written. It is his books, his published papers and the unpublished ones, as well…"

McKay feels his heart speed up. There is an O2 tank next to the bed in case he needs it. He feels as if he needs it.

"You were aware that he is an inventor?"

Another head shake.

"There are plans here for things he built, many of them similar to Ancient technology."

The longer Zelenka speaks, the more ragged McKay's breathing becomes. Grabbing the non-rebreather, he signals for Zelenka to turn on the tank. He takes slow, deep breaths and feels his heart begin to slow. He removes the chain from around his neck, looks at the tiny object, about half the size of a gaming die, dangling from it.

This is the entirety of Pistoule, _The Known World_, which McKay sorely missed, and everything else.

While McKay brings down his heart rate, Zelenka says, "I need the cube for research."

The Czech doesn't seem at all surprised when McKay grabs back the pendant and holds it to his chest.

"Rodney, Pistoule wants to fix the machine. He needs to use notes in the cube to facilitate this."

McKay takes up the datapad. _Why does P. have info on the machine?_

"He seems to have written about most everything," Radek explains. "It is good because otherwise I'd get nothing from him," and he circles a finger around his head.

Rodney rolls his eyes. _Pray it never happens to you_, he types.

"I know. It is a shame."

_Alzheimer's, dementia, brain cancer, aneurysm, stroke..._

Radek watches him type. "Stop it! I know!"

_They did this to him. It isn't his fault_.

With that, he throws down the datapad and falls back against his pillow. He glares at Radek, furious and exhausted. Then he closes his eyes to center himself.

Zelenka sighs. "I am sorry that you are ill, Rodney. You will be well soon, though, God willing. In the meantime," he says, standing, looking huge and hale and sturdy beside the depleted McKay. "I'm the acting chief science officer for this expedition. Dr. Pistoule needs the cube." He holds out his hand expectantly.

Rodney drops the cube into Zelenka's palm. His colleague closes his fingers around it.

"I'll provide regular reports. I promise," Radek says.

McKay taps the datapad again. He turns it so that Radek can see the screen. _Don't lose it_, he's typed there. _Precious_.

OoOoO

Pistoule extracts information from the cube. He does this with things he's picked up around Atlantis, small tools, conductive materials and conduits of one sort or another.

All of Pistoule's books and papers are downloaded onto two laptops, one of which is given to McKay, even though he's still in the infirmary. He reads Pistoule's papers and the transcripts of his lectures, and then he pauses at his favorite passage, on page 510 of _The Known World_.

McKay shows this passage, part of Pistoule's "Essay on a Unified Theory of Life," to Zelenka:

"In our interconnectedness we give of ourselves and take up from others, without an awareness of doing so. We borrow, we lend, we take, we are taken from. Our energy moves like this from person to person, until each being has touched every other."

_Naïve but fascinating_, types McKay. _He wrote this as an undergrad. Self-assured even then._

"Like you?" Radek asks.

OoOoO

Elizabeth visits the infirmary every day to see Rodney and John. She looks a bit ravaged from her insomnia, but no one mentions it. Now that Rodney's awake, especially since he started reading Pistoule's tomes, she doesn't linger too long with him, lest he begin another hours-long sermon extolling the World According to Pistoule. Truth is, she is so happy to see McKay getting better that it scares her.

A couple of times, now, Carson's asked Elizabeth if he can talk to her in private.

"Not yet," she tells him.

He wants to talk about timetables, about how John's body is slowly disintegrating from lack of movement, from the minor infections, and how there's some fluid buildup in his lungs.

There's still time and there's still hope, but if something happens, something terrible and sudden, Carson wants to know that she's okay with it, that no one will avoid him in the halls on account of what he does—or doesn't do.

Elizabeth has nothing that John needs. As she skids through sleepless nights and blurry days, she thinks that her rest is given up into the air, because it is the only thing she has to offer.

"John," she says, licking dry lips. "We're doing everything that can be done to help you."

A small yellowish patch, the remains of a bruise, shows clearly on the back of his hand. She rubs at the bruise, wonders how it got there, then considers that she might be better off not knowing.

OoOoO

John's just skinned his knee while running with friends and is walking home to the cottage with the green braided rung. He doesn't know how he's finding his way there. The things he passes are familiar even though he's never seen them before. There is the shop where cakes are sold. Beyond that stand other small businesses run by his friends' fathers and homes kept tidy by his friends' mothers. The street ends with a large, cement structure. That is the government building where Papa works all day.

His knee is swelling and aches with every halting step.

John tires of limping and worries about the blood sliding down his leg. He's starting feel helpless and upset because he is in a lot of pain and wants someone to pick him up and carry him home. But the cottage is still far away. No one who cares about him is here to help. Eventually, he sits beside the byway, sucks on the back of his hand to comfort himself, and cries.

"My child, what has happened?"

John feels himself being picked up and held close. He wraps his arms around his father's neck.

"I hoped you would come," he says between sniffles, not ashamed to weep because Kalians as a people cry easily.

"I will always come for you," his father says. "Rest. We will be home soon."

TBC…


	18. Part 3, Chapter 4

**Part 3, Chapter Four**

"'The measure of our joy lies in our sorrow.'" Pistoule stands beside Radek, quoting himself again.

Zelenka couldn't agree more. He has in his life witnessed many tragic moments, and also a great many joyous ones, not the least of which, strangely enough, is the sound of Rodney McKay talking, again.

Zelenka has brought the machine to Rodney, since Beckett will not allow Rodney to go to it. The thing that may have killed Colonel Sheppard's mind lies at the foot of McKay's bed. Its geegaws and doodads spill out in a way that only the greatest Kalian mind can figure. If that.

Elizabeth and Carson nervously watch Radek and Rodney handle the device, as Pistoule stutters out information that only he understands.

"We… I… Huh…" Pistoule's disjointed speech matches the schism in his brain.

McKay seems rather pissed off at himself for being sick while something technical needs his attention, even though he is just a few days off the vent. He leans down to examine the device.

"And you want to connect this thing to what?" McKay asks, without looking up.

"Dr. Pistoule has requested a naquadah generator," Radek replies, testily, not bothering to hide his skepticism.

McKay's eyes dart to Pistoule. "You can't be serious."

"I'm not. He is."

"And it's going to do what?"

"I'm not really sure." Radek points at their Kalian counterpart. "He hasn't been all that good at explaining things."

As he has done many times before, Pistoule stands close to John, stroking his black hair, his cheek. So much sadness exists in that touch, it seems far too deep, too intimate to be simple compassion.

Pistoule says, "Toma," as he moves his hands in a gentle rhythm.

Elizabeth appears captivated by this and almost swaying in time to his ministrations. She snaps alert when Radek loudly clears his throat.

"Perhaps Dr. Pistoule should use the machine on himself first," she says. "If it works properly, he may be able to communicate better afterwards."

Overhearing her, Pistoule raises his hands defensively. He shakes his head. "I am not… not…" Unless Pistoule is quoting his own writings, he can barely utter a complete sentence.

Radek eyes him cautiously, unwilling to trust someone so obviously disabled.

"It… It…" Pistoule shakes his head. He rubs his face, made shiny with sweat, made high pink with the effort to communicate.

Without the ability to even begin an explanation, Pistoule leaves John for the moment. He approaches the machine and the small items that Radek has brought along with it, and holds up the clips he wishes to use to connect the machine to a power source. He makes a humming sound.

Everyone waits and waits.

"Then what happens?" Elizabeth asks, looking at Radek, then Pistoule, then back to Radek, who shrugs as if Ronon were giving him lessons.

"Naquadah generator," Pistoule says, demonstrating, again, and humming.

Radek shakes his head. "The power output is too great."

"No, it is not!" Pistoule looks achingly desperate.

"Yes, it is!" Radek counters. "You could destroy a large portion of the city if something went wrong."

"No!" Pistoule says again, furious tears welling forth.

McKay, who Radek notices has been unusually quiet, ignores the quarrel.

"You've run simulations?" he asks.

"Of course!" Radek pokes at his datapad. "They were incomplete. Skewed."

"Why?"

Handing his datapad to McKay, Radek shrugs and says, "Garbage in, garbage out."

As Zelenka watches, McKay surveys the screen, frowning at the truncated results.

"He saved my life, you know," McKay says, keeping his eyes on focused on the pad.

Rodney is still pale. His voice is rough from the vent. He is alive, though, and stronger each day.

"A naquadah generator is worlds apart from a folk remedy," Radek responds, ignoring Rodney's withering look.

Concentrating, McKay pokes at the keyboard. Then he looks up at Pistoule across the way, at John, who is the reason they are gathered there.

"Carson, I want a cot moved into the lab," he answers.

"What's this, now, Rodney?"

"Radek, copy the schematic and your data to my laptop."

Zelenka comes almost to attention. He's seen McKay like this many times before. Already the physicist is gathering himself up, pushing aside the bedcovers.

Carson's at hand, fussing. "Where do you think you're going? You're hardly up to working!"

McKay points to John, and it is obvious that further explanation is unnecessary. Radek can't help but smile.

He turns to Carson. "I will take good care of him," he says.

OoOoO

Teyla has been waiting for Elizabeth to make a repeat appearance at her quarters. This hasn't happened, much to the Athosian's relief. Teyla spends considerable time in the infirmary with John. On occasion, she pays short visits to Rodney in his lab, although he is usually either too busy for her or resting on the cot. Sometimes Teyla spends all day running through empty parts of the city. Sometimes she runs to one of the piers and watches the water lap against the seawalls.

When Carson calls Teyla to his office, she assumes it's about John. When she arrives, he closes the door and sits on the edge of his desk with his arms folded across his chest. Teyla crosses her arms, as well.

Carson knows. Elizabeth told him or he guessed it himself. Doesn't matter how. Carson knows.

His office feels stiflingly close, airless.

"Perhaps we should go outside," he suggests.

They walk to a quiet spot where the breeze isn't too strong. There are no chairs here, so they both sit against a city wall, wrists on knees, looking out over the water instead of at each other.

"First he threatened John," she says after several minutes. "Held a weapon to his head and said he would kill him in front of me. Then he threatened Rodney. The prison Warden. He did this."

"Did he strike you? Touch you in any other way?"

She shakes her head. Carson's surprisingly easy to talk to, now that Teyla is finally trying to do it.

"Is there a chance that you are…"

"No."

He doesn't ask if she's sure, which makes her appreciate him all the more.

"Teyla, I'm not going to pretend to fully understand what you must be feeling. You were violated in a way that no one should ever experience. But I will suggest that you allow me or Dr. Biro to examine you, not just for that but a complete check up. You were gone for half a year and placed in the harshest situation imaginable. You should begin seeing Dr. Heightmeyer, as well."

She doesn't say anything for a while. She's making up a deal in her head.

"Rodney and John must never learn of this," she says. It's not about Teyla getting over it. It's about making sure that other people don't have to. She turns and looks at Carson for the first time since they began discussing one of the worst experiences of her life. "They will not understand."

"This is all confidential, Teyla. I think Rodney and John would understand, though, if you were to tell them."

"It is not necessary that they know."

_Teyla holds her hand to the force shield and feels John's energy leap back and forth between them. Rodney lays his chin on her shoulder as she embraces his thin body._

If she had to choose again, her choice would be exactly the same.

A nurse calls through Carson's headset. An arm injury has just walked into the infirmary.

Teyla stands. The wind is stronger five feet off the ground. "If anyone else knows, tell them that it is my business. Whoever knows. Tell them."

Carson stands with her. "I will. I promise."

She hears the message in her own headset. _"It's Dr. Zelenka, Dr. Beckett. He needs a few stitches."_

"I'll be right there," he replies. Then he places a tentative hand on Teyla's shoulder. It feels good to her. Warm. Gentle. Sincere.

OoOoO

Rodney much prefers himself when he is sharp, acerbic, energetic and fully aware of how stupid everyone else is. Today he does not feel anything close to normal, but he is getting accustomed to feeling shitty and is working within those parameters as well as he can.

If he stays on the physical and emotional centerline, then he can function. If he gets excited, if he moves too quickly, then his heart races and his lungs stiffen up like wet paper bags in a freezer.

Zelenka stuck his arm inside the machine and lacerated it on the edges of the blast hole. Carson sews him up.

"You're turning into a dumb jock," McKay tells his colleague, averting his eyes as Carson prepares another suture.

Radek grimaces with irritation and waves McKay away.

Now McKay is alone in the lab with Pistoule, who relentlessly insists on using the naquadah generator to power the machine.

"Doctor," says McKay, uncharacteristically respectful but typically irritable. "You don't need an entire nuclear power plant to operate a single light bulb. And you don't need a naquadah generator for this one machine."

"Necessary," Pistoule replies. "The organic interface..." and then he sputters in frustration.

"Yes, I know it's damaged." McKay crosses his arms, willing himself to be calm. "What is its purpose and what will the machine do?"

"I will make it work."

"How?"

"I will!"

Without even checking his pulse, McKay knows his heart rate is climbing. He is thoroughly sick of being sick.

"Tell me how," he says, taking a long, slow breath as Carson instructed.

Instead of answering, Pistoule paces the lab, expressing his dismal frustration by twisting his tiny, quivering hands forward and back. McKay considers summoning Teyla and her tranquilizing magical juju, but Pistoule takes his wrist to stop him from reaching his headset. The Kalian's eyes, huge and dark against his thin, pallid face, reflect a mix of brilliance, suffering and kindness so hypnotic that McKay can't bear to see it and can't bear to look away.

With the frightening directness of a criminal who has decided to come clean, Pistoule takes up the laptop containing his books and notes and papers. He brings up a file within a file within a file that bears the name "Toma."

"Toma?" McKay asks. "What does this mean?"

Pistoule shakes harder. Watching these tremors makes Rodney feel unwell, so he opens the value on his O2 tank and takes a few toots of pure oxygen. As McKay moves to shut off the tank, the other physicist takes the mask, sits on the floor and inhales slowly and deeply.

After a while, his arms stop shaking and his head stops bobbing and his eyes become alert and focused.

"Toma," he says, looking at McKay with total clarity, as his mouth works to make all of the words come out. "He was my baby. My little boy."

Then he drops the mask and places his hands over his face

OoOoO

Radek Zelenka is almost done getting nine stitches in his left arm.

"Good thing you're right-handed," says Carson.

Radek watches Carson working with the needle, not at all bothered by the sight of it.

"Good thing I'm not Rodney," he responds. "You would be deaf by now from the screaming."

"Morphine, my dear Radek, tames the wild beast."

"_Zelenka, I need you in the lab right away_."

For a second, Zelenka thinks that Rodney may have overheard his conversation with Carson Beckett.

"What's the problem?" he answers.

"_Just get here as soon as you can_."

It's only another minute before Carson snips off the last suture and wraps the wound.

When Radek returns to the lab, Dinstard Pistoule is sitting on McKay's cot, holding the mask to his face, rocking slightly to comfort himself.

"Hallway," McKay says, grabbing the Czech's arm and pulling him out of the room. He's a bit wheezy, but not alarmingly so. "The machine wasn't used on Pistoule," he says, pacing anxiously.

"Of course it was. The Kalians said so."

"They were wrong. He's not brain damaged. Not in the classical sense…"

He stops for a few seconds and looks at Pistoule, watches the man use up his oxygen.

"Do you need more?" Radek asks, noticing.

"Not yet. Let me finish. He's not brain damaged. He's psychotic, he's crazy, and he knows it."

Radek hardly knows what to say. "The shaking, the stuttering…"

"Like I said, he's crazy. Complete psychotic break. And he wasn't exposed to the machine. His son was."

"He has a son?"

"Had a son. A young child."

Radek thinks of Colonel Sheppard, lying almost dead in the infirmary. Pistoule stands by him, crying, stroking, remembering.

"Toma," Radek says, and McKay nods with a gravity the Czech has rarely seen on anyone. "They used the machine against his child?"

McKay coughs, making a heavy, rumbling sound. His face is getting a little pink, which would look healthy if Radek didn't know better.

"The machine was supposed to be used…" and McKay coughs more, his face becoming bright red.

"I will get the mask," Radek says, moving past McKay and going back into the lab.

Apologizing, Radek whips the equipment from Pistoule's hands and returns to the hallway. He lays the tank on the floor and settles his colleague beside it. The tank is nearly empty.

"Dr. Beckett, I need you at the lab, please."

He hears Beckett almost sigh. "_Rodney?"_

"Yes."

McKay takes Radek's wrist, desperately intent on speaking. Radek stills himself. He is already frightened of whatever McKay is about to tell him.

"The machine…" McKay begins again. "…was to give his books to everyone. To put them…" He points to his head, and Radek understands right away.

"Similar to downloading the Ancient library."

"Government… punished him… used the machine on his son… a little child…killed him."

This is the first time that Radek has seen Rodney McKay cry. It's not a pretty sight.

"Pistoule...suffered a mental collapse. The machine…is his invention!"

"Oh, my God!" Radek looks back into the lab, at Pistoule, who is crying because he hears what McKay's saying between the wheezes and gasps.

"Stop talking, Rodney," Zelenka says. "Tell me the rest later. Please."

Dr. Beckett shows up then. He has epinephrine and albuterol and more O2 and even some loza, which he's managed to process into an odorless tablet.

"What's this, then?" he asks, checking for lung sounds.

Radek replies for Rodney, speaking so this friend will not have to. "He got overexcited and wasn't using his tank."

"Overexcited?" Beckett queries.

"I'll tell you later."

"'Ere, now, Rodney, what's got you worked up?"

Unable to answer, Rodney uses every bit of his strength to breathe. His hands clench and unclench as the doctor prepares a nebulizer and starts him on a full tank of oxygen. Carson and the techs who accompany him set the breathless man on a stretcher.

"He'll be okay, Radek. Don't worry this time," Beckett reassures him.

Radek listens to McKay's frighteningly familiar wheezing as his friend is wheeled away. He probably should go along, but can't in good conscience turn his back on Pistoule.

"_Radek?_" Elizabeth speaks in his headset as he approaches the cot set up in the lab and the grieving man seated on it, a man who looks like a child.

"Not now," he says.

"_What's going on?_"

He takes off his headset, sits down on the cot and places his arms around Dinstard Pistoule.

"Toma," Pistoule sobs, tucking his head under Radek's collarbone.

"I know," Radek replies.

TBC…


	19. Part 3, Chapter 5

_**A/N:** Thanks, go to my betas, Inkling, Aslowhite and Pranksta. All errors are mine alone. As the story approaches its final stretch, let's find out what happens next..._

**Part 3, Chapter Five**

Now they seem a little bit dangerous, the stroking, the comforting murmurs. As Pistoule runs short fingers through Sheppard's unruly hair, glaring madness stands out against his dark history.

"He must feel so guilty about his son, he wants to help Colonel Sheppard to make up for it."

McKay doesn't react to this. Radek can read into Pistoule's motivation as much as he wants.

Elizabeth and Heightmeyer speak with Becket in his office, door closed. In the meantime, McKay rests and works with the laptop and the data on the machine, and then rests again. He's recovered from his latest episode, which angered Beckett and worried Zelenka, who had promised to look after Rodney.

Carson fussed and took a chest x-ray and insisted that Rodney take more loza. The highly processed tablets have no taste or smell; the _idea_ of them nauseates more than anything else.

When Beckett and the rest end their conference, they approach Pistoule with a creepy forced jocularity that sends shivers down McKay's spine. He was a prodigy. People fear brilliant minds as much as crazy ones; he's certain that Pistoule would understand this if they discussed it.

"We have some medications that may help you," Heightmeyer says. "Risperdal and a calming agent. They may clear your mind and allow you to live without the panic attacks and hallucinations. Would you be willing to try them?"

The little man twitches nervously. Even Elizabeth is taller than he. Before Pistoule has a chance to bolt, Teyla enters the infirmary. He runs to her, wraps his short arms around her waist, as if she were his mother. She looks over his shoulder at Beckett, asking her questions without speaking.

"We were suggesting…"

"Carson." McKay can't stand it anymore. "Just stop it for now. Give it a rest."

He has never admonished Beckett about something like this. He doesn't know why he's doing it, now, except that he knows firsthand how thin the line is between genius and madness.

Pistoule doesn't let go of Teyla for a long while. She waits for him to finish.

OoOoO

On this day, hours following Pistoule's sad revelation, John begins to show absolute signs of dying. He has an infection, a sepsis that is beaten back and returns and is beaten back, but is returning stronger than ever. His fever climbs, his body can't fight for itself any longer and refuses to let Carson fight for him. The dreams become shorter. The dead times, when John is in them, last longer.

In this dream, John lies on a thin, lumpy mattress. Springs squeak when he moves even a little bit. A loza bug creeps along the cold, stone floor. He hates loza bugs and wouldn't think to touch one.

A man turns off the force shield that stands between John and freedom. The man seems enormously large, as he picks John up and carries him under his arm to a room two flights down.

The room contains a chair, a wooden table and a metal box. John is too frightened to struggle or speak. The man who carried him into the room pushes him to sit in the chair. John's short legs do not reach the floor. He keeps his eyes tightly shut and holds his small hands to his face to keep the bad things away.

Voices come through the walls, muffled but clear enough.

"…see what _you_ have done!"

"Please, no. You can't. You mustn't. I beg of you…"

"We burn your books, so you create a machine to take their place?"

"Destroy it, then! I do not care! Punish me, not my child!"

The rest of this memory is strange. John looks up. The machine hums. It vibrates on the wooden table, dancing left and right as if it were happy. 'Happy' is John's last thought before his head explodes with pain so sharp and blinding he thinks it will kill him, kill everyone who ever lived. Ideas fill up every space in his head, quotations and formulae and schematics that he can't possibly understand. All the while he hears Pistoule crying, Pistoule screaming and clamoring and then…stony silence.

This silence is the overload, what happens when his brain seems dead. Peace lives in here, and sometimes when the noise and Pistoule's screaming are too much, John actually looks forward to it.

After the silence, muted awareness filters in. Elizabeth speaks to him. Or McKay does. Someone puts their hand on his and squeezes. Teyla talks about the weather. Ronon's resonant voice reaches him, and it chokes him up because Ronon is dead.

John can't open his eyes and tell anyone what is happening to him during these brief visits home. He feels the pain of the infections and their accompanying fevers. Carson's trying to help him heal, but John feels himself slipping farther and farther away, is aware that his body is dying and so is his mind, and soon they will both be gone altogether.

Sentience lasts thirty seconds, a minute at most. It ends when the cycle begins again, with dreams of a childhood he didn't live on a planet he never should have visited.

In the dreams, the child whose memories John carries says, "Papa…"

Pistoule screams behind the cinderblock wall. "Toma!"

Then John _is_ this child and he hears Toma say, "Papa, I want to go home."

OoOoO

Little pudding cups sit on a cafeteria tray placed atop Radek's usual work area.

"A peace offering," says Pistoule, as he hands one of the cups and a plastic spoon to Zelenka. "It is called vanilla. Most unique!"

Rodney, who sits on the cot holding a laptop, looks up from his work as the Kalian turns to him.

"Yes, some for you, too, Dr. McKay!"

Pistoule's been on Risperdal for less than 48 hours. He takes small doses of Valium. Both drugs have had an unusually swift effect, making him perfectly cogent much of the time.

The pudding signals that he is no longer mad at them. A few hours earlier, Pistoule was sputtering with anger, as both Radek and McKay refused to allow him to hook the machine to the naquadah generator.

"We don't know what the machine does," Radek said, repeating himself for the hundredth time. "Or how it's supposed to help Colonel Sheppard."

"Trust me," Pistoule said, his familiar plea.

"We trust you. Sort of. Don't we, Radek?" McKay said, straddling both sides of the field.

"The generator isn't bug juice, Rodney," Radek told his colleague. "There is a difference between a few insects in the mouth…"

"C'mon! You don't have to be so graphic!"

"…and the possibility of blowing the Colonel and the infirmary and a quarter of the city to little, tiny bits!"

In the throes of chemically induced sanity, Pistoule rose to his full height—about four inches shorter than Zelenka—and puffed out his chest indignantly.

"I give you the cube. I give you everything that I am, and you deny me the opportunity to save him, to bring him back. You are as cruel as the prison warden and the disciplinarians who did this to him!"

Then he stormed out of the lab.

"You had to mention the bugs, didn't you?"

"Rodney, please, you have to realize…" But McKay shuffled to the cot and sat down heavily, still too weary to fight.

"He is your hero, yes?" Zelenka asked.

McKay didn't look at him. He sat quietly as Zelenka brought him some water, which he sipped and then used to wash down one of his medications. Then McKay said, "We should let him try."

"Why? Because now he speaks in complete sentences? Do not be blinded by your admiration of the man he once was. Using the generator is too dangerous…"

"Sheppard's dying, Radek. Define 'dangerous.'"

"With or without this organic interface Pistoule keeps mentioning, who knows what could happen? _That_ is how I define 'dangerous'!"

The machine is a marvelous invention, but a flawed one. For every brilliant page downloaded into the brain, a piece of memory or a necessary function is extracted. This is the problem that Pistoule was trying to correct when he was arrested and imprisoned. This is the flaw that killed six-year-old Toma when the Warden chose to torment his father.

Now that Pistoule has returned to the lab as a calm, pudding-bearing individual, Radek hopes that they can discuss the machine's operation from beginning to end without arguments in between.

As he and Rodney eat the dessert, Pistoule fiddles with the machine, patches the ragged hole in its side with duct tape.

"Doctor Pistoule…," Radek begins.

The small man holds up his hand to stop him. "If you will not let me do what must be done, then all shall be lost."

"What is the organic interface made of? You have to be clear about this."

They stand on either side of McKay, who stares down at his laptop tiredly.

"It must be done tonight!" The little Kalian argues over McKay's head.

"_What_ must be done? We hook up the machine and then?" Radek retorts.

"I will take care of the interface!"

"We don't even have enough information to run a computer simulation," McKay says. He looks worn out and despondent, as he yawns and massages his forehead. Radek doesn't want another argument with Pistoule. Rodney isn't up to it.

"Perhaps a smaller unit," Radek offers.

Pistoule shakes his head. "You have not been listening."

Zelenka sighs, feeling lethargic himself. He eyes McKay, who appears to be nodding off.

The many hours of worry and work draw Radek to the lab bench, again, where the machine and his data challenge and confound him. Pistoule comes closer. He speaks quietly, his voice smooth and steady from the Risperdal and the Valium. Pointing out features on the machine schematic, Pistoule uses words that Zelenka doesn't know, like "solinium parser" and "mazdy junim."

Radek's vision blurs, so he removes his glasses and rubs his eyes. It doesn't help.

"…the organic interface will bring the consciousness forward, combine with the energy shield created by the generator and initiate a synchronous interaction..."

These words land together in a confused jumble. Radek can't focus on their meaning, as each syllable becomes just another sound among many strung together. His eyelids grow heavy, his ears ring, and his hands shake a little bit. Pistoule continues to speak. Radek imagines his voice is honey dripping into his ears.

"…organic interface…" Pistoule says again.

Radek tries to focus on this important detail but can't because he's become nauseated and dizzy.

"I'm not feeling well…" he mumbles, unable to speak more clearly. The ringing in his ears is so loud he barely notices anything else.

Pistoule stops talking and takes Radek by the arm.

"Do not fall," he says, and Radek stands up from his lab stool and feels as if his legs have no bones in them.

"What has happened?" he asks, trying to blink through the haze in front of his eyes.

"It is late. You and Dr. McKay are very tired."

"Rodney?"

"He is sleeping. Here, I will lay you next to him on the cot…"

But Radek doesn't want to lie next to Rodney. He doesn't want to lie down at all.

"No, no…" he manages, as he falls to his knees. Pistoule releases Radek's arm and places a gentle hand under his drooping head.

"You sleep, Dr. Zelenka," he whispers, as Radek slumps over completely. "Sleep and dream."

OoOoO

It is very early morning. The sun has not yet risen. Elizabeth has tried reading and exercising and meditation and stretching. Earlier, she strolled over to the cafeteria and heated up a glass of milk for herself.

She considers walking out onto one of the piers and watching the sun rise over the city. If Radek is awake, maybe he'll walk with her.

Then it occurs to her that if Radek is awake, he is most likely working on the machine, which is much more important than Elizabeth Weir's state of mind ever since she and sleep declared war on each other.

So, instead, Elizabeth walks to the infirmary, where she sees that Pistoule has set the machine on a rolling cart and placed a naquadah generator next to it. He hurriedly works with the wires and levers and knobs that he's culled from other objects located throughout the city.

"Is the machine working again?" she asks.

He doesn't reply. The generator hums softly.

"Dr. Pistoule?"

TBC…


	20. Part 3, Chapter 6

**Part 3, Chapter 6**

When his stomach revolts as he lies on the laboratory floor, Radek manages to crawl up to wakefulness and grab the waste bin, where he loses the pudding and the some of the 100 mg of Valium that Pistoule ground up into it. When he finishes with that, Radek sits up cross-legged and shakes his head to clear it. He is still drugged and wants more than anything to push Rodney off the cot and lie down there himself.

Instead, he crawls to the cot to wake Rodney, who doesn't stir even when pinched, hard, on the arm.

It's starting to come through to Radek. He looks about the lab, which appears as a pool of colors swimming before his eyes. Creeping over to the work table, he struggles to pull himself up, as if he's never lifted a barbell in his life. He scoots his hands around the tabletop—the machine is no longer there. Cursing, he ambles unsteadily to the opposite end. The generator's gone, as well.

"Security…" Zelanka fingers his headset. Gone. It takes him a while, and he has to hold onto things to keep from falling, but Zelenka finally reaches Rodney, again, and takes the sleeping man's head in his shaking hands. No headset on him, either.

The infirmary is several minutes' walk from the lab. Alert buttons dot the walls along the way. Managing to just miss colliding with the doorjamb, Radek stumbles out into the hall. He pauses to get his bearings. Then, using the wall for support, he lurches toward the only logical place that Dinstard Pistoule could have gone.

OoOoO

Carson Beckett lies sprawled on a bed near his office, snoring softly. An empty pudding cup and a plastic spoon lie on the floor nearby. Elizabeth taps the physician's cheeks and calls to him. A sleeping nurse occupies the next bed over.

"Sorry," Pistoule says to Elizabeth with a shrug. "You people eat too many sweets."

He continues to set up the machine. "This will work," he says, to himself this time.

"Where is Dr. Zelenka?" she asks, as a shiver creeps up her spine.

The doctor connects the machine to the naquadah generator.

"I thought that he was gone forever." Pistoule carefully peels off the duct tape, exposing the blast hole in the machine's side. "But he is here…"

His hand strokes John's hair. "I feel him. You must have felt him, as well. Have you not noticed?"

He says this as the generator lights up, as its insistent hum fills the infirmary.

Pistoule reaches for Elizabeth's hand and places it against John's cheek, which is hot with fever.

"Do you feel him?"

"John?" Elizabeth asks, confused.

"Toma! He is here with your friend. He is _dying_ with him!"

She doesn't say anything, but removes her hand from John's face and reaches for her headset to call for Radek and Rodney or anyone who might be close by. He stops her, gently takes her arm and holds it still. He is steady, level, utterly collected.

"Do not act, Dr. Weir. Feel."

He places her hand over John's.

"Feel…"

Pistoule's surprisingly resonant voice captures Elizabeth in its hypnotic web. She has no defenses, all of them scraped away by ages and ages without sleep.

"Feel…' he repeats, as Elizabeth's eyes slide closed.

One thought hits her. Another rolls in right behind it, and another after that. It is John, as he always is, defiantly, almost ridiculously confident. Someone else comes, who whimpers in despair. Then it is John, again, hopeful, waiting and alive. Elizabeth's eyes fly open and she stands there, stunned.

"He is…" she begins, not daring to believe.

"They are," answers Pistoule. He twists a couple of wires together, snips the ends and caps them.

The infirmary is silent save for the small sounds as the Kalian continues to work. His breaths become heavier and more erratic, and Elizabeth realizes that he is crying.

"I created the machine so that we could study peace together," he says, nodding at Sheppard as tears well and roll down his cheeks. "He was all that I had in the world. They stole my inventions and burned my books, then sent me to prison. They told me that I would die. 'No matter,' I said. 'I do not care.' Oh, but then they took my child!"

His words tear at Elizabeth's heart. She remembers the photographs of genocide, of torture, and sees before her all of that suffering in one man, this one, who cries and wipes his nose on his sleeve as he completes whatever he came here to do.

Nimble fingers refine the last necessary connections. The machine hums on the small table on which it lies. It hums and dances an inch one way and then another, as if it were happy to be alive, again.

OoOoO

Radek doesn't remember hitting the floor, the third time, or recall what he dreamed while he was down there. He has missed the alert buttons in the hallway because he can barely see straight and keeps passing out. His woozy mind confabulates movement up ahead and voices around the corner or behind him.

"Hey," he calls to the people who aren't there. "You don't notice me?"

A few minutes pass before his urgent purpose reasserts itself, forcing him to rise. His stomach threatens to erupt, again; his feet feel like they're pointing in two different directions. He thinks that Carson surely will prevent Pistoule from using the machine, that one of the beefier nurses will tackle the little Kalian and keep him down until a security detail arrives. He also thinks that the Ancients ought to have considered less angular interior walls, because Radek needs something smooth to slide against as he continues his loopy journey.

OoOoO

The machine has been placed directly on the bed, at the end, snuggled between John's feet.

Pistoule chuckles. "I will keep it here. Wouldn't do if it fell onto the floor."

He twists his hands nervously, expectantly. A quiet whine comes from the blast hole. He peers into it.

"Not ready," he says, scowling.

Elizabeth knows that she ought to summon security. Whatever is happening, whatever Pistoule is making happen, Rodney and Radek ought to be there and Carson ought not to be lying on the other side of the room, oblivious to the plight of his patient.

"Dr. Pistoule, please explain what you're doing."

When he pauses and touches her cheek, Atlantis drops away, and she is back in Sarajevo, listening to testimony of atrocities so heinous that sleep eludes her for months afterwards. Elizabeth is looking at photographs of thousands upon thousands of Pistoules, their large eyes open wells of suffering.

"Stand away," he says, motioning her back.

There is no reason to trust him, but she does. Radek chants the destruction of half of Atlantis, McKay worships the ground Pistoule treads upon. Elizabeth sees the broken man and can't bring herself to deny him this.

"Toma is here," he whispers. "You must trust me. I would never harm my beautiful child!"

The machine whines more loudly as it powers up. The pitch drives higher and higher until it goes beyond normal hearing and becomes a non-sound, a silent ringing inside her head, like John's reassurance and someone's despairing whimpers. It is both terrifying and oddly comforting.

The sound pitches up even higher, and now the machine becomes more than a plain metal box. It begins to shine from its place between John's feet. The shine envelopes the box and then a bright, sheer curtain of light erupts from within the machine's core, shooting from the gaping hole in its side. The light makes Elizabeth's skin crawl, like a million ants clamoring underneath it. It arcs up and over John and the bed on which he lies, which shakes and dances happily one way and another.

The room crackles with energy from the naquadah generator, from random charges needing to ground. The curtain of light becomes less transparent, as if it had form and mass and were more than mere energy. Pistoule backs up further, pushing Elizabeth away.

"Not safe for you," he says, his face coming very near so that she can hear him above the noise. His eyes are even larger this close, and their pain and her own awful memories swallow her up.

John stirs and seizes behind this incandescent shroud. Medical equipment surrounding his bed throws off showers of sparks as the delicate parts inside of them react to the generator's ambient charge. The room smells of fried electrical components and melted plastic, and things pop and hiss and sputter from the strain.

Then there is Pistoule, backing up a little more, readying himself. A security detail storms the room, weapons raised, but Elizabeth holds up her hands to stop them. The generator hums in a dizzying crescendo, superheating, running itself faster and faster, as Pistoule's machine whines with a special pitch of its own. The greatest Kalian ever born mouths the same thing over and over. Elizabeth doesn't need to hear it.

"Toma…Toma…" he says, as he turns to look at her, his face suddenly awash with bliss. Then he runs and jumps as high as his stocky legs can carry him into the curtain of light, which captures him, holds him fast as it sizzles and vibrates and glows yellow and red and green and blue and purple and then the whitest white.

Radek Zelenka calls to Elizabeth from the doorway, but she doesn't hear him. She realizes that he has come when he stands in front of her, swaying on unsteady legs between her and what danger the machine may pose, staring with dread and wonderment at the incredible sight of Pistoule suspended in the brilliant scrim.

Pistoule is held like this for several seconds, unmoving, until the energy he so willingly embraced cuts off and releases him with an explosive sound so loud it knocks Elizabeth and Radek to the floor. The deafening rumble echoes across the city, and Elizabeth covers her ears to protect them.

Pistoule falls to the floor, limp and staring.

Radek begins rising, but fails at that and falls back heavily. Elizabeth stares in awful fascination at the sight of John's heaving convulsion, a churning so strong that he is a blur of motion. His breaths come in gasps whenever his body lets him take them, just like McKay's do when things aren't going very well for him.

Then, incredibly, John stills and absolute silence prevails.

TBC…

**A/N: And so the penultimate chapter ends. I am proud of those who guessed what was probably going to happen, because you figured it out long before Zelenka and McKay did.**


	21. Part 3, Chapter 7

**Part 3, Chapter 7**

A smoky haze from burned-out electrical components lingers after the light and the noise have ceased. Dinstard Pistoule lies dead on the floor beside Elizabeth. A piece of wasted medical equipment dies with a sputter in the quiet room. The sound pulls Elizabeth from her daze; she remembers that it's her job to direct and organize and handle things.

"Get Biro in here!" she shouts at the security personnel that she remembers are there. "Broadcast on the citywide for all medical personnel to report."

Someone—maybe one of the security detail, maybe a nurse—hauls her to her feet, asks if she is okay, then leads her to a chair out of the way. A limp Zelenka is lifted from the floor and laid on a bed. Elizabeth stumbles over and sits beside him on the mattress, as a tech assesses him and asks about the explosive sound.

"He should be more responsive," the tech says. Then he moves Elizabeth away as a medical team surrounds Radek.

A crowd forms around Sheppard's bed, as well. Biro is there, her hair disheveled, interrupted sleep pinching her face. Whatever has happened to Sheppard, to Pistoule, Elizabeth is responsible for it. She thinks _What have I done? What have I done?_ She watches the pandemonium. _What have I done?_

At Sheppard's bedside, Biro and another doctor confer and whip their stethoscopes from around their necks and listen to his chest. They take rubber-tipped hammers and dink John's knees and elbows. The machine, blackened, its metal casing ripped, is carefully moved from the bed, secured in a container and hauled away. A new EEG device ticks away, spitting out graph-paper strips.

Carson mutters irritably from his bed. He sits up quickly and nearly falls off the side, before a tech and a security officer catch him and lay him down again. The plastic pudding cup beneath Carson's bed is bagged and given over for testing.

A wheeled stretcher bearing McKay arrives with a field team sent to the lab to check on him. A flurry of white coats surrounds him. Like John, he disappears behind people and diagnostic equipment and IV bags hung from poles. Elizabeth hears him speaking softly, answering some questions, failing to answer others.

All of this activity happens as Elizabeth waits for her ears to stop ringing and tries to come back to herself.

When Radek opens his eyes, she tells him what the nurse said, that he has a lot of Valium in his system and was given Flumazenil to counteract it. He looks around the infirmary, taking in the people and the noise, before nodding off again.

It takes a while, but Elizabeth recovers, rises and crosses the room.

Dr. Biro stands over John Sheppard, checking his pupils. The doctor looks up and nods Elizabeth forward.

"Look," she says. Elizabeth follows her gaze.

John lies as still as stone, but next to his bed the EEG shows high mountains of brain activity.

"Does this mean he's coming back to us?" she asks.

Biro sighs. "I don't know. Since we didn't completely understand his condition before, we can't determine exactly what is happening now."

For a great while longer, the infirmary buzzes with security, technicians, doctors and nurses, plus the snoring of one zoned-out Scot and an equally serene Czech and Canadian.

OoOoO

Ronon has scars on his arms and on his head and scars in places that Rodney can't see. Radek has scars, too, terrible ones. Elizabeth looks as if she hasn't put her head on a pillow in years. The pillow under Rodney's head smells like himself. Half of his face is buried in it when he wakes up, so he watches Ronon and Radek and Elizabeth out of the one eye that is free.

The Satedan sits beside Sheppard's bed across the way, passing time by leafing through an old copy of "Martha Stewart Living" that someone brought from Earth. Radek sleeps in a bed beside Rodney's. From time to time, Elizabeth crosses Rodney's line of vision. She is making a groove in the infirmary floor with her endless movements from one patient to another.

Ronon senses McKay staring at him and flips the magazine away. "Pistoule's dead," he says.

Rodney closes his eyes.

When the diazepam begins wearing off, Rodney visits with John, who moves his head from side to side. He is still down in the deepest part of dreaming, but he is there all of the time, now. His EEG does not change over to brain death and then back to dreaming. It shows solid Delta, a wall of sleep, that soon—maybe—will crumble completely and let them have John back on their side again.

Biro insists that Rodney use a wheelchair; Radek, as well. When they protest, Dr. Biro says, "One hundred milligrams of Valium? You get chairs."

"Carson didn't have to be wheeled around after he woke up," Rodney protests.

"He most certainly did," Biro counters.

"Oh. I didn't notice."

"You slept through it," Radek tells him. "You slept through everything."

"In case you haven't noticed, I've been sick."

"Yes, Rodney, we know. That is why you didn't wake."

Elizabeth makes a fuss over Radek. She helps him from the bed to the chair and asks him if he's feeling up to this. The Czech thanks her and raises his eyebrows in response to McKay's wily grin.

The scientists are brought to the morgue, where they view Pistoule's body. Zelenka is amazed that there isn't a mark on him. They discuss what he did, how he must have known all along what he would have to do. Radek describes the curtain of light, how it prickled his skin. Rodney remembers the force shields at the prison and how he and Teyla and John were kept apart by them.

"He was sane when he did this," Radek reminds them both.

"'No love exists without sacrifice.'"

The Czech looks at McKay.

"Pistoule?" he asks.

McKay nods. "'My life and soul are dust without would I give them to save the life and soul of another.'"

OoOoO

John hangs between worlds.

Teyla says the names of those he loves most: herself, Elizabeth, McKay, who might have survived after all… She says, "Ronon," and John feels sad because the Satedan fell from the jumper and died.

Teyla asks, "Can you hear me, John?"

Carson asks, "Can you open your eyes?"

McKay asks, "Good morning, Colonel. How are you doing today?"

Pistoule is searching his child. No one has to tell John about this. It's something that he already knows. John waits for a reply. Waits until he feels his heart break.

"_Toma?"_ he hears over and over, and _"I am looking for you, little one…"_ and someone wipes John's face and says, "I don't know why he's crying."

Then. Finally.

"_Papa."_

"_My beloved child! You are here!"_

When John hears the voices without, he wants more than anything to reach them. When he hears the voices within him, he feels their immeasurable heartbreak and joy as if they were his own.

"_I waited for you, Papa. Please take me home!"_

"_We will go home together,_ _Toma…_"

John feels them embrace each other, breathe each other in. John is father and he is son. He is born the moment that he first holds his infant child. He is the infant child borne into the arms of his father.

Carson and Teyla and the others tell John how well he's doing. They say that he will soon recover enough to talk to them. They don't hear the dialogue in John's head.

"_Papa, I want to go…_"

"_We will go home…"_

"_Papa, I want…_"

"_We will…"_

"_Papa…_"

"_Together..."_

John holds on to Pistoule and Toma for as long as possible. Their love fills him and guides him back to where he began, before he lost hope and was force fed, before the Warden said "…a sacrifice she seems willing to make," and before McKay became ill and before Ronon perished and before "Uh, oh."

John opens his eyes, but it's not him seeing out of them. Elizabeth stands beside him. He moves his hand and tugs at her sleeve. Pistoule and little Toma speak through him.

"Thank you," they say, closing John's eyes to her surprised response.

Pistoule and Toma lead John back to Atlantis and settle him there. Then they are gone forever.

OoOoO

McKay has brought in pieces of the machine and examines them at John's beside. He speaks to John as if he were awake.

"This is part of the memory transfer mechanism," McKay says, holding up a thing that resembles the twisty part of a corkscrew. "It used to sit just beside the main power transducer, but now they're a fused mess, so…"

McKay chatters. It's therapy of a sort. John really loves hearing it, hearing the sounds of the words as they slide into each other. As he often does, McKay speaks too fast.

"Slow down," John says.

McKay looks up at him, startled. "You talked!"

John stares.

"Well? Talk more!"

"_You_ talk more."

McKay looks over at Carson, who hurries to his patient and quickly assesses him.

"Your name?" he asks. Then, "Where are you?" and "Who is your president?"

John, whispering, answers everything correctly, which satisfies Carson for the moment. The Colonel notices McKay's eyes getting red and soupy, so he's glad for the doctor's interruption.

The machine parts lie on the beside table. McKay's hand shakes a little as he holds up each item. His voice catches in his throat a few times when he explains what it is. Then Rodney talks about what the machine was supposed to be used for and the despicable way that it was misused by the Warden.

John listens carefully, but says nothing for a while. Rodney is thinner than the last time they were together. His expressive face shows a weariness that reaches down into McKay's soul, as he moves bits of the machine around and fingers a chain around his neck.

"I'm trying to rebuild the machine," Rodney says.

"Why?" asks John.

Rodney's hand comes away from the chain and Sheppard sees what looks like a little silver gaming die hanging from it.

"Why," McKay echoes, and looks at John as if this question had never crossed his mind.

OoOoO

The bed shakes as someone sits upon it.

"Sheppard."

John opens his eyes and sees Ronon Dex, his long-departed teammate. Because Carson asked to be notified "if anything strange happens," John reaches for the call button. It is indeed strange to feel the bed dipping where Ronon's ghost sits, and it is strange when this apparition hands the call button to him. It is strange when this person who has been dead for over six months pats John's arm and says, "Hey."

"Hey," John says in return, looking around to see if anyone else thinks it unusual that Ronon's spirit has come to visit him. The large man's short hair sticks out in all directions. Nappy twists at the ends look like little gestating dreadlocks. Like McKay, Ronon looks thinner, but his eyes radiate fathomless joy.

Ronon says, "Bet you thought I was dead, huh?"

John nods. If Ronon is alive then he's very happy. If Ronon is dead, then he's very, very sad. Either way, he can't help getting worked up about it, as he remembers how the jumper broke open...

Ronon hands John a tissue from the box next to the bed. John feels embarrassed and unbelievably lucky and tired out from just this brief reunion. He turns to lie on his side. Ronon puts a solid hand to his shoulder.

"We took you out of there," he says. "Teyla and Rodney and I didn't forget about you."

John senses that Ronon's been waiting a long time to say this. If Ronon were truly dead, he would not have delayed his visit. This is how John knows that Ronon isn't dead, after all.

He says, "Thanks, Ronon."

Ronon brings his face in close to Sheppard's. "Any time," he says, as he puts his hand to John's head and musses his hair for emphasis.

John smiles into his pillow and falls asleep feeling as if his team were curled up around him.

OoOoO

A physical therapist works on John's arms and legs, readying him to move on his own again. John prefers when Teyla or Ronon or someone else he knows well touches him. They speak without speaking, seeming to guide him with their thoughts. When they seat him back on the bed, the connection continues after their hands leave his body.

Ronon tells John about falling from the jumper and about his long recovery at the Institute. He speaks fondly about a friend he made named Nevillus, a PT like the one who works with John, who helped him get better. Then Ronon describes the three times that he and Nevillus and others went to the prison to free their people.

Rodney describes in circuitous fashion his illness and the means by which Pistoule cured him. He quotes Pistoule a few times, while fingering the chain around his neck.

Teyla describes Sheppard's rescue and how the Daedalus picked them up out of empty space when they all had but seconds to live. She talks about how she and Lorne's team captured hundreds of loza bugs and the machine at the same time.

As each member of his team speaks, John senses a veil of darkness over them that lifts higher each day. He suspects that much was given up for him, that Teyla and Rodney and Ronon gave up a lot for each other.

OoOoO

A couple of times a week, in the late afternoon, John visits with Heightmeyer and then returns to his quarters to rest.

Today, he and Kate discuss Teyla and what he knows about her…_he places his hand against the force shield_…and what she told him—without uttering a word—long before the Warden ever did.

"How will this affect your team on missions?" Kate asks.

"It won't," he replies, without having to think about it.

"At all?"

It's not just Teyla. It's the four of them. They have become a single entity. What has happened to one part has happened to them all.

Kate cocks her head. She's so demanding.

"We're fine," he says, relaxing into his usual parlance.

"So you say."

"We are stronger than before. Ask any of us."

"I have," she says, smiling. "And you are."

He talks about the months he spent with the Kalians, about the time at the end when a father and a son were living inside of him. John decides that if it were possible to replay the last moments of Pistoule and Toma's lives, if he could do it without Ronon falling from the sky and McKay becoming ill and without Teyla raising her hand to the force shield, he would.

When John sees Teyla next, she greets him in the Athosian way. He loves that he survived to feel her forehead against his and the warmth of her hands resting on his shoulders.

"Do you wish to walk outside?" she asks him.

They find a quiet spot, the same place where Radek and Elizabeth discussed hope and faith and perseverance when Sheppard and his team were still missing.

The two lean against the city wall and gaze out over the vast ocean, which is as still as glass this evening.

Teyla says, "All of us, even Rodney, know to follow our training when missions do not go as planned. But sometimes that does not work and we have to follow our hearts instead."

He shifts self-consciously. "Teyla…"

"They speak a different language that ordinarily we cannot understand, and they make demands that ordinarily we cannot follow."

She looks at him, waiting. This is so like Teyla, patient to a fault.

He asks, "You okay?"

"I am fine," she replies.

"You're sure?"

He watches her. After a while, Teyla nods and doesn't say anything else.

They stand out there and watch the sky darken into night. John's a good deal stronger than he was a month ago, but he still must keep from overexerting himself. He needs to eat and rest, now. Teyla seems to sense this because they turn at the same time to go back inside. This is when he stops her and puts his hand up and tilts his head in invitation. Teyla places her hand flat against his and leaves it there until they have nothing else to share right then.

The next morning, John wakes and strolls outside to watch the sunrise. The day is perfectly clear, with no fog or haze to limit visibility. Atlantis shines like a crystal palace on days like this.

Movement down on the southeast pier catches his eye. McKay's out there. The physicist has joyously gained back some of the weight he lost and feels so well these days that Carson has stopped giving him bug pills, much to everyone's relief. On the pier, McKay is so far distant that John can't see exactly what he's doing, but, all at once, Rodney throws something into the water and watches it make a tiny splash and disappear.

As he strolls back towards the city, McKay has a spring in his step that hasn't been there since before their last mission. John can't be certain, but he senses that his team really will be fine, after all.

Later, John joins his team in the cafeteria. This is not the first time that they have eaten together since he regained consciousness, but today they have agreed to meet at a specific hour. Elizabeth has joined them, with Radek Zelenka and Carson Beckett and a couple of other people.

Rodney isn't fiddling with the chain around his neck anymore. When John looks closely, he sees that the chain and the die that hung from it are gone.

Teyla is baking something in the kitchen. The little, lopsided cake that she brings to the table smells of spice and fruit. Everyone receives a tiny slice of this offering. That is enough, because the cake is heavy for its size.

The cake tastes like nothing John's ever eaten before. It is smooth and sweet and grainy and sour, and it is incredibly satisfying in every respect, and it leaves him wanting more, all at the same time. It is like the people that he loves, it is like knowledge and like life itself, united in this place at this time.

FIN

**_A/N:_** _And so it ends. _

_Thanks go to my betas, Aslowhite, Pranksta and Inkling, to Mutecornett, whose drawing inspired me, and to everyone who trusted me enough to follow the story through to the end. Thanks also to my husband, Mr. Skypig, and my kids, Piglet 1 and Piglet 2, who put up with me while I was absorbed in this effort._


End file.
